13.4 The final section of the survey with Gypsies and Travellers looked at some of the ways in which they would like to see accommodation options change and what some of their preferences were around accommodation.
Long stay residential sites
13.5 A total of 16 respondents said that they would like to move to either a long-stay residential site or a different residential site. Just 3
households on unauthorised encampments were interested in this. No respondent on the unauthorised developments was interested, as they said they were happy where they currently were. A total of 5
114 (15% of the sample from socially rented sites) 4 of these households were from the Stoke-on-Trent site. Seven households from private sites expressed an interest in a moving to a different site (19% of the sample from private sites in the Study Area). Two households from bricks and mortar accommodation (1 from Staffordshire Moorlands and 1 from Newcastle) reported a desire the move to site based accommodation (7% of the bricks and mortar sample).
13.6 We asked all respondents who expressed an interest in long-stay sites how long they would expect to stay on such a site. The majority of people could not indicate a time and simply answered ‘don’t know’ (78%); 9% thought they would stay on the site for around 6 months to 1 year; 6% thought they would stay between 3 and 5 years; and, 3% thought they would stay on a site for 5 years and over.
13.7 There were mixed views on the preferred size a long-stay residential site should be. No one thought a site should be less than 5 – 10 pitches with a few indicating that 30-50 pitches was the maximum number. There seemed to be a general consensus, however, that a site containing around 10-20 pitches would be their preference. This also supports recent guidance on site design released by the CLG (currently in consultation form).
Transit/short-stay sites
13.8 A total of 28 respondents said that they would be interested in stopping at a short-stay or transit site (23% of the sample). This comprised of 8 households on unauthorised encampments; 6 households on socially rented sites; 7 households from private sites; and, 4 households from bricks and mortar accommodation.
13.9 We asked all respondents who expressed an interest in short-stay sites how long they would expect to stay on such a site. The majority of people could not indicate a time and simply answered ‘don’t know’ (63%); 5% felt they would stay for a very short time (1 week); 10% thought they would stay on the site for around 2-4 weeks; 8% thought they would stay between 1 month and 3 months; 8% thought they would stay between 3 months and 6 months; and, 3% thought somewhere between 6 months and 1 year.
13.10 Similar to long-stay residential sites there were mixed views on the preferred size a site should be. No one thought a site should be less than 5 pitches, with a few indicating that 20 pitches was the maximum number. There seemed to be a general consensus, however, that a site containing between 5 -15 pitches would be their preference.
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Incorporated long-stay and short-stay sites
13.11 We also asked people what their thoughts were about sites that incorporated both long-stay pitches and short-stay pitches. Most respondents said they did not know (65%), 20% thought it was a good idea with around 16% viewing it as a bad idea. We asked people to comment on their answer. Comments in favour of such a site included:
“I think it’s a good idea because if our children wanted to come and stay with us for a week or two they could.”
“Yes good idea, it would give people a chance at least.”
“It means you can have a change, it would be like it was years ago for today’s younger people.”
13.12 More tentative comments included:
“As long as the people coming on to the site are nice it’ll be ok but we don’t want people upsetting the place.”
“It all depends on what people are mixing as Romany and Irish don’t mix well.”
“People can go and stay with their families, but I wouldn’t be happy about strangers staying though.”
13.13 Views against such a site included:
“Short stay people disrupt the permanent people.”
“No, transit people would leave rubbish and not keep the place tidy.”
“There would be too many people moving on and off, the site would get run down quickly.”
13.14 Overall, it was clear from the people we spoke to that it was not thought a good idea to mix residential and transit users on the same site. However, a number of people commented that it would be good to have the ability to visit and stay with family who lived on sites.
Therefore, where short-stay pitches are made available, on residential sites, some control over transit users may be necessary in order to ensure and maintain feelings of safety and cohesion for the more permanent residents.
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Accommodation preferences
13.15 We asked all respondents to comment on their preferences for different forms of accommodation:
• A private site owned and lived on by them or their family • A site owned by another Gypsy or Traveller
• A site owned by the local council • A family owned house
• A local authority or housing association owned house • Travelling around and staying on authorised transit sites
• A ‘group housing’ type site (mixture of transit/residential/chalet/ trailer accommodation)
13.16 The answers were ranked on a scale from 1 to 10; 1 being the worst option for them and 10 being the best option. The mean (average) answer for each scenario are presented in preference order in Table 48 below. This shows that by far the most preferred form of
accommodation is a private site owned either by themselves or their family. This is followed by a site owned by the local authority, and then jointly by the maintenance of a travelling way of life where people move from site to site, and ‘group housing’. Living in a privately owned
house was seen reasonably favourably. Living in a local authority or housing association house was regarded as the least favoured option, followed closely by living on a site owned by another Gypsy or
Traveller.
Table 48: Views on type of accommodation preferred
Type of site Mean answer
A private site owned by them or their family
8.6
A site owned by the local council
7.5
Travelling around on authorised transit sites
5.6
‘Group housing’ 5.6 A family owned house 5.2 A site owned by another
Gypsy or Traveller
4.7
A local authority or housing association owned house
4.0
13.17 We also asked for people to talk freely about the kind of things they wanted to see developed. A number of comments were made including:
“We need more family run sites so that families can all be together. We need more help with planning permission and there are lots of people who need council run sites.”
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“Where we live needs to accommodate horses with us being horse drawn. We need grazing and a lot of sites don’t have it.” “It would be good to know there was a network of transit sites to use if you needed them but they must be run properly by the council.”
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14. Travelling Showpeople
14.1 Travelling Showpeople occupy an unusual position in planning terms and a separate planning Circular, detailing the particular planning needs of Travelling Showpeople, has recently been produced; Circular 04/07. As well as detailing the requirements for pitch identification and allocation for Travelling Showpeople, Circular 04/07 also requires that the accommodation needs of Travelling Showpeople are included within GTAAs.