The big problem, it seems to me, is the fact that the general public cannot distinguish between the genuine Roma, the traditional non Roma traveller community, and the self styled "New Age Travellers", who have no tradition, having just dropped out of society in the 1960s, and who are probably the authors of most of the problem behaviour.

The fact that these three discrete groups are lumped together in the public consciousness is unfortunate.

As I said Jim in answer to your question, I came into contact with travelling people as a lad, and nobody seemed to have any distrust or dislike for them.

However, they were almost exclusively Roma, many still inhabiting horse drawn Vardos, and when they moved on periodically from the piece of unused ground where they customarily stayed, you wouldn't know they had ever been there.

They were mostly welcome visitors, as were the "gentlemen of the road" (tramps), who periodically appeared and did a few odd jobs in return for a meal or two.

That world vanished with the start of the swinging sixties.

Contrast that with modern scenes of stripped down cars and rubbish scattered along grass verges and lay bys, and add in pub brawls and general mischief, damage to farm land etc.

I'm not even sure that one can apply the term racist to comment about travellers who are UK born drop outs.

The presence, or absence, of the signs is quite unproveable and serves merely to divert attention from what are the real concerns of the travelling community on the one hand and the settled community who are vulnerable to any misbehaviour on the other.

Don T.