Mums Could Go To Prison for Living on Their Family’s Own Land

Brentwood Borough Council must urgently withdraw women who have children from their injunction.

Brentwood Borough Council are going to court with the intention of sending the mothers of 11 young children to prison. They are doing it to try to stop them living in caravans on land that is owned by their family and which will be the subject of a Planning Inquiry before the end of the year.

We urgently need Brentwood to withdraw the women who have children from their injunction. 

The background

The family are descended from “Irish Travellers” and grew up on land owned by a family member for many years which although without planning permission had been tolerated by the Council for many decades. Seeking more space as their family grew, and due to extensive overcrowding on the land, they expanded onto a neighbouring section of Green Belt land that the family also own, as there were no alternative sites or pitches available in Brentwood. They engaged a planning consultant to submit a planning application to the Council.

But instead of waiting to review the planning application, Brentwood Council obtained what’s known as an interim ex parte injunction against the family. This required that there was to be no residential occupation on the land. However, the injunction didn’t mention the overcrowding on the tolerated site and crucially that the families were currently living on the new piece of land which should have meant that no immediate eviction order would be made.

Mixed messages

In need of help, the families reached out to a private law firm, asking for a solicitor to make a variation application to allow them to stay on the land pending the outcome of a planning application that was before the Council. However, due to no fault of their own the Solicitors were intervened upon and no application to vary the injunction to allow them to stay pending the planning process was made, despite the fact that it had been incorrectly stated by the Council that no one was living in the caravans. In the light of no application to vary the court ordered that the interim injunction to continue.

The families were advised to pack up and leave the land, which they did, only to be told by police to return to it so that they didn’t obstruct the highway. The police clearly did not want the family to become a problem by living on the roadside when their own land was unoccupied.

After several delays beyond the family’s control, a final hearing to review the injunction was listed. The Council had originally told them that this hearing was unlikely to go ahead as their planning application was likely to be resolved by then. 

Having been somewhat reassured by the Council's words, the families had thought that they had time to breathe as they made plans to process their planning application instead. 

However, the hearing did take place, and a final injunction was imposed, prohibiting the families from living or building on their own land at all. 

Targeted for the way they live

But it did not stop there. Brentwood Council then decided to issue ‘committal proceedings’ against the residents on the basis that they were in breach of the terms of the injunction. This included the fact they had moved back onto the land, and further allegations that they were breaching other parts of the injunction by putting up walls and fencing. 

The Council waited until the first day of the final injunction hearing to issue these proceedings. They did not tell the families that any of this would occur or be included.

More recently the Council have been in consultation with the families to regularise the tolerated sites in this location and have them allocated as lawful sites as part of their local plan process. The families have been told by Council officials that this would include the site subject to the injunction. 

Despite these mixed messages. Currently these women with young children face being sent to prison or a penalty or sanction for breach of the injunction against them. 

How have PILC worked on this case?

PILC saw that the opportunity to apply to vary the final injunction and defend the committal proceedings on the basis that the families’ caravans were on their land before the injunction was issued and that their planning application has prospects of success. We have:

• Instructed a planning consultant with expertise in Gypsy and Travellers’ planning law to produce an expert report. This identified that the families’ planning application had a prospect of success, taking into account  the lack of alternative sites for Gypsies and Travellers in Brentwood, and the children’s best interests.
• Instructed an independent welfare social worker to produce a report on the welfare of the young children and the potential consequences to them of being moved off the land and/or their mothers being committed to prison.
• Instructed Counsel Alan Masters of One Pump Court to advise as to the prospect of varying the injunction.
• Applied to vary the injunction. 

The need for local pitches in Brentwood

There is a distinct lack of sites (called ‘pitches’) for people to live on in Brentwood. All Local Authorities have a duty under Planning Policy for Traveller Sites (PPTS) to provide a 5-year supply of sites for Gypsies and Travellers against their locally-set targets. 

Brentwood Council haven’t done a needs assessment for sites for Gypsies and Travellers for over seven years. Their needs assessment data is woefully out of date, and was collected at a time where a restricted definition of Gypsies and Travellers was used (2015), meaning less need was identified than was actually the case.  

This 2015 definition was declared discriminatory by the Courts and the Government has returned to an original definition used in 2012. This should result in a fairer more accurate assessment of what need there is in Brentwood. In anticipation of the need being much higher the Council have been consulting on where new sites could be allocated and this included regularising those tolerated and unauthorised sites currently in the District.

What happens next? 

If these families are evicted from the land, there is nowhere else for them to go. They face living on the roadside where they will likely be moved on by the police again.

We urgently need Brentwood to withdraw the women who have children from their injunction. 

Instead of ripping these families apart, Brentwood Borough Council need to undertake a new, up-to-date assessment of the need for sites for Gypsies and Travellers in the area. They must provide suitable alternative sites to meet this need.

They could agree to adjourn the Court eviction proceeding against these families at least until the planning inspector hears the planning appeal and decided whether to allow them to stay on the land they own.

Three ways to help

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We’re shocked to find out that this family of Irish Travellers could go to prison for living on their own land. We urge @Brentwood_BC to withdraw the women from their injunction, so 11 children can stay with their mums.
https://www.pilc.org.uk/news/mums-could-go-to-prison-for-living-on-their-familys-own-land/

@Brentwood_BC don't rip this family apart. We urge you to withdraw the women from the injunction now!
https://www.pilc.org.uk/news/mums-could-go-to-prison-for-living-on-their-familys-own-land/

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