Is it time to say sorry to travellers and give them a few quid for past wrongs?

"More than half of Travellers who drop out of second level have done so by the age of 15. The number of Traveller children who go onto third level represents just 1pc of the Traveller community."

This is supposed to be something the state has done to Travellers?

Travellers have traditionally taken their children out of school during adolescence so they don't develop relationships outside the Traveller community. Early school-leaving is closely connected to the Traveller tradition of consanguineous marriage. Admittedly, Irish state agencies have been unconscionably lax in enforcing the legal obligation of Traveller parents to send their children to school at least until age 16 — but to claim that the problem originates with the state is simply wrong.

Travellers don't want third-level education. Imagine that most Traveller children were going on to third-level education and becoming doctors, nurses, teachers, and engineers. Would they be happy to come back to the halting site, marry their cousins, and pop out numerous children as tradition dictates? Not at all — they would meet other partners through university, work, etc., and quickly integrate into the settled middle class. Third-level education would destroy Traveller culture in short order, and Travellers know that, so they reject it.

The majority of Travellers' woes are self-inflicted. Their "traditions" of early school-leaving, early consanguineous marriage, large families (half of Traveller women have five or more children), nomadic drifting, etc., do them no favours in the modern world. So we owe them no "reparations."

The country is €200 billion in debt, and we can't afford to be doling out "reparations" to everyone with a grievance.

Plumbthedepths wrote: »

Cradle to grave welfare, I think we are already giving them a more than generous helping hand.

When we recieve our reparations from the Brits for centuries of colonisation, it is only fair we give 0.6% to the travelling community.

It's bollo. They choose, (culture aside. Nobody forces me to do a jig), choose to live that lifestyle. Everyone should be treated equally. If you want to play outside of societies rules, take the consequences. We all need an address to function, so unless you're on the Fine Gael sponsored homeless scheme, you've no excuse or reason to have several rotating addresses.