COUNCIL OF EUROPE.

Post war several countries dismayed at the devastation and upheaval formed the Council of Europe and GB was a founder member where Churchill stated that Jaw,Jaw was better than War,War.It was the common denominator  in a manner of speaking that the acceptance of the Human Rights ideals would form a basis of agreement upon which to build a new future.At first there were ten countries but today there are 47.

It falls upon the Human Rights Commissioner to keep an eye on standards and warn individual States if they are falling below acceptable standards.In 2011 he had reason to complain to Eric Pickles,the Minister,in the following fashion:

"I call upon you to ensure that an end be put to violations of the right to adequate housing of Travellers in Basildon and that local  authorities are made aware of the U.K.'s obligations to respect the right to adequate housing for Gypsies and Travellers"

An exchange of letters can be found on the Council of Europ's huge website.

Mr.Pickles uses the argument he still employs today.He points out that HMG provides money with which local authorities can build sites -which is true but beside the point because what has been lacking so far is the WILLINGNESS to grant planning permission to certain classes of citizens - notably those aspiring to a mobile lifestyle-the nomadic way of life is one that is -according to the United Nations-perfectly legitimate.

You may despise it but you may not discriminate against it.

Here we meet with one of the core considerations which the Council of Europe always puts before its member States at regular intervals by a sort of audit.In what manner do you deal with minorities in your territory ?Do you have a strategy ?Does this strategy encourage inclusion or does it on the contrary encourage discrimination ?   

The architect of the Velvet Revolution,Vaclav Havel,had a measure of how much a nation had achieved maturity :he said  you can tell this by how well it treats the minorities.

Lots of countries fall below the highest standards and in this case it is our own politicians  who have put England on the Naughty Step....inhabited as usual by France,Spain and Italy who have all  engaged in hounding Roma or Sinti communities or sending them  back to Hungary by the trainload.

When Basildon Council first voted to set aside cash to conduct an eviction the opposition  pointed out that they had not examined the offers made by the Homes and Community Agency who had declared a willingness to try and find government land with which to rehouse the residents of Dale Farm.That should have been considered and not overlooked. 

Richard Hewitt (Lab)M.E.P. was at pains to point out that in the European Parliament he had consistently voted against measures taken against the Roma in Europe and he could not endorse similar methods used in his own country against Irish Travellers.