'I'd quite like a council house, but I'd not get one on the grounds that I don't qualify as needing one. That's just the way it is.'
Well the issue is that very few private landlords or agencies will take a self employed tenant (something that would really affect us). It's 6 months of payslips or fuck off around my way, a way that seems to have a very high proportion of travellers comapred to 'home' (and less Traveller/ crime issues- no idea why mind).
So we would be housed, as would a Traveller, in lieu of other accomodation (as conformed by LA). I don;t really want a council house though; I would go without an awful lot as for some reason there's a sense of giving in attached to being housed but that might be becuase I was raised on a bad estate and we fought for years to have a nice home only to encounter a few difficulties that make us a priority now.
Except there isn't any, maybe a B&B and living in those is a nightmare existence, or at least has been for the friends I have had / famillies I have supported in them.
People can;t just step into MS society; it takes paperwork and records and unless you can buy a house outright housing will a singularly massive issue for you.
All the travellers near us live in horrid, scrapyard-like wastegrounds, next to motorways and main roads. I seriously doubt that's what they want any more than anyone else. At the site I see most days, a long-unused premises, I suspect the risk to the children from abuse and traffic is higher than the risk to anyone from the community living there; indeed they have been there for ages and the LA have provided toilets with no sign of eviction so I guess nobody cares much.