The Council has belatedly published its strategy for managing the needs of the Traveller community in the City.

The report will be discussed at a meeting being held on 4th June.

The Council is now deeply mired in controversy over the way that it allocated land for new caravan pitches at 3 sites around the City and for the “Showman’s” layover site near Knapton.

Two of the sites are on land confirmed as Green Belt in 2011. The expectation is that landowners will take the opportunity, of the land being removed from the Green Belt, to propose more potentially lucrative uses for it (retail or residential).

This will mean that the Council will have failed in its quest to find traveller pitches which meet its own estimates of demand (last updated in 2008).

Like the secret ARUP report, which Labour Councillors claim justifies the need for an additional 22,000 homes in the City, the supporting papers for the Local Plan do not include up to date assessments of demand for either gypsy or showman’s sites.

The Council report says that Gypsies and Travellers are one of the largest distinct ethnic groups in York and their traditions and history can be traced across hundreds of years in the City. There are approximately 350 families in York, living on traveller sites, in housing and in caravans on the roadside.

The report suggest a range of actions that need to be taken

It notably fails to suggest ways in which mutual respect and tolerance between this minority and the general community can be improved.

There is a lot to be commended in the Councils list of proposed actions.

Had the strategy been published 6 months ago, it might have helped to set the scene for the difficult planning decisions which lie ahead.

Instead the Council’s immature political blundering means that it has been launched into a potentially hostile atmosphere.