£10m to be invested in improving travellers’ life chances

£10m funding for traveller sites across England aims improve life chances and reduce unauthorised encampments.

The funding will allow councils to provide improved transit sites and stopping places, so travellers have authorised places to stay, and access to facilities and services.

Councils can also bid for funding for new permanent sites to meet the needs of travellers in their local areas, as well as using it to refurbish existing sites.

As part of the levelling up work being done across the country, this fund will be invested in helping to improve travellers’ life chances, by giving them easier access to local services including healthcare, education, and employment.

It is hoped that by providing more and better places to stay, tensions between travellers and the settled community can be reduced, as well as the high costs of tackling unauthorised encampments.

Communities Minister, Kemi Badenoch, said: ‘It’s vital that everyone has access to the kind of services that offer the best support. So, these new and improved sites will give travellers easier routes to healthcare, education, and employment.

‘This funding is just one of the ways the government is improving opportunities for communities across the country.’

This funding can be used for new sites; improve existing sites through both refurbishment and rebuild; improve site infrastructure; or pay for public spaces on existing sites, such as community centres, play areas for children and stabling for horses.

By building more sites and temporary stopping places, it also aims to reduce the number of unauthorised encampments in England; reduce enforcement costs for councils; assist councils and local police in redirecting travellers from unauthorised encampments, and therefore enhance community cohesion between the settled community and travellers.

In addition to this fund, councils can already apply for a share of the £11.5bn Affordable Homes Fund for permanent and transit sites, and bricks and mortar accommodation for travellers.

In related news, over 60 environmental charities and professional bodies have argued that a ‘legal right to nature’ should be placed at the centre of the government’s levelling up agenda.

Photo by Johann Walter Bantz