The National Traveller and Roma Inclusion Strategy 2017-2021 (NTRIS) represents a whole-of-Government approach to bringing about meaningful change and progress for the Traveller and Roma communities in Ireland. It is a living document that will be reviewed and adjusted as required. Traveller and Roma organisations were involved in its development and are members of the Steering Committee monitoring its implementation which is chaired by me. The Strategy contains 149 actions, grouped under ten themes including Accommodation.
The National Traveller Accommodation Consultative Committee (NTACC), under the remit of my colleague, the Minister for Housing, Planning and Heritage, was set up under the Housing (Traveller Accommodation) Act 1998 to advise the Minister for housing in relation to, inter alia, the most appropriate measures for improving, at local level, consultation with, and participation of, Travellers in the provision and management of accommodation and general matters concerning the preparation, adequacy, implementation and co-operation of Traveller accommodation programmes.
An expert group was appointed in 2019 to review the effectiveness, implementation and operation of the Traveller accommodation Act, 1998 with a view to examining whether it provides a robust legislative basis for meeting the current and future accommodation needs of the Traveller Community, which takes effective implementation into account in the context of the recognition of Traveller ethnicity in 2017.
Membership consists of representatives of Government Departments, including a representative from my Department, NGOs and Local Government.
The report completed by this expert committee is currently being reviewed and is still under consideration.
