THE RESIDENTS of the Dale Farm Travellers’ halting site have pledged to physically resist attempts to evict them, after the British courts ruled out the chance of a final appeal.
The residents of the site had last week lost their High Court bid to have their eviction overturned – and today were told by the Court of Appeals that they would not be given leave to appeal that decision.
A spokesperson for the group – which encompasses around 400 people from 86 families – conceded to the Guardian that the community had now reached “the end of the road” in trying to legally block the eviction.
One of the residents, Kathleen McCarthy, said: “The lawyers say this is the end,” before pledging to “fight the bailiffs off”.
We’re already in lockdown – we’ve been left with no choice. We really have nowhere else to go. Do you think we’d put ourselves through this if we did?
Today’s ruling brings to a conclusive end the ten-year battle between the residents and Basildon council, which has been trying to evict the families from the greenfield site in Essex.
PA quoted the leader of the council, Conservative councillor Tony Bell, who said the residents had been “living on borrowed time” since last week’s ruling, and asked them to leave in a peaceful and safe way.
The evictions would continue at a time of the council’s choosing, he said.
The council has already expressed unease about news that the perimeter around the illegal portion of the site, has been reinforced in order to resist the eviction.
The 49 illegal plots occupy around half of the Dale Farm site. The residents are ethnically Irish Travellers, though almost all of the group were born in Britain.
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