Gardaí survey Travellers amid outbreak threat
GARDAÍ have conducted a full site survey of an illegal Traveller encampment on the Curragh plains to prepare for a potential Covid-19 outbreak, the Irish Mail on Sunday has learned.
The identities of all those staying at the camp were verified this week in case the HSE has to conduct contact tracing with the Travellers who set up camp during lockdown last month.
A source told the MoS: ‘Names and ages of those staying in the camp were taken. ‘Say there is an outbreak. We’ll be able to say who has left and who has not and where people have gone.’
The MoS can also reveal that gardaí put ports on alert this week after an anonymous Twitter user claimed there were 30 cars and caravans at a UK ferry port preparing to travel to the Curragh for a ‘Traveller religious weekend’.
However, there was no evidence found of that number of caravans coming to Ireland this week.
The number of camps at the Curragh has been reduced from three to two. There are now 35 caravans and 161 people in the area.
‘We’re down to two camps at the moment. One was moved on over the course of a number of days by gardaí,’ the source said.
Officials attending the camps are advised to wear full personal protective equipment (PPE) because of ‘poor social distancing’ among the residents.
The MoS has also learned an annual religious event held by Christian group Light and Life Mission, which gardaí feared was an attraction for Travellers setting up the camp, has been cancelled.
Pastor Michael Quinn told the MoS he cancelled the event last weekend after receiving a call from Newbridge gardaí. He said it is his understanding that only two or three families in the camp are members of his church and said they were not there to attend his religious missions, which are held in June and July annually in a circus tent in Monasterevin.
‘I don’t know everyone down there, but they’re not there for my event. If they are there for it they are six or seven weeks early.
It is understood several more camp members told the gardaí they would like to move on from the Curragh, but prior approval will be needed before this can be facilitated. A source said: ‘There is discussion underway between the gardaí and the Traveller Mediation Service on condition they provide an alternative address and they agree to isolate and abide by the Covid-19 regulations.’
Sinn Féin TD Patricia Ryan told the MoS she has written to Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan about the situation in the Curragh but has yet to receive a reply.
‘I have spoken to gardaí and they are doing all they can. I’m very much aware local people are annoyed, but there’s nothing we can do other than liaise.
‘We have to look after the local people in the area, the farm land and the military land, we can’t have any mess left after it at a cost to anyone there. But realistically, because they (the Travellers) don’t have anywhere else to go, they have to be looked after, so there are two sides.’
Ms Ryan was stronger in her criticism of the Travellers when she spoke to the Kildare Nationalist newspaper earlier in the week.
‘They’re giving two fingers to the gardaí,’ she told the newpaper.
‘I’m flabbergasted this is allowed. They have English registrations, I was told by the Defence Forces.’
The MoS revealed last month that 25 caravans arrived by ferry from Bedforshire in England and set up camp on the Curragh, on April 9, two days after the lockdown was signed into law. Two further camps of around 20 caravans were later set up in close proximity. This week the MoS spotted military helicopters flying above the camps. There were also checkpoints in operation in an attempt to turn back caravans going to the site. Over the Easter bank holiday weekend, two vans ‘drove straight through’ a Garda checkpoint without stopping and in through the camp entrance, the source said. Martin Collins of Traveller organisation Pavee Point told the MoS at the time it is ‘inexcusable’ that the group arrived during lockdown and questioned how they were allowed on a ferry in the middle of a health emergency.
‘It’s important we know who is and isn’t there’
‘They don’t have anywhere else to go’