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Roma face 'intersectional' bias as FLAC opens 61 files

The chief executive of FLAC, which campaigns for improved access to justice, has said rights are never more important than during a pandemic.

Eilis Barry was speaking as the group published its annual report for 2019, which highlights particular concerns about the treatment of the Roma and Traveller communities.

Department of Justice funds

At the report launch this morning, FLAC solicitor Sinead Lucey said that the body’s Roma legal clinic accounts for a large body of its work and is directly funded by the Department of Justice.

In 2019, FLAC had 112 open case files and 61 of these were opened on behalf of callers to FLAC’s Roma legal clinic.

The Roma clinic dealt with 30 callers on housing matters, 16 on citizenship, 15 on discriminations, 12 on social welfare, six on family matters, five on criminal matters and four on employment.

“Roma women seem to attract particular hostility, most likely because they are easily identifiable when they wear traditional dress such as long skirts and head scarves," Sinead Lucey said.

This is a barrier to Roma accessing employment in the hospitality sector, she continued.

FLAC was also involved in settling defamation, discrimination and personal injuries proceedings, which had been initiated against Dublin Bus on behalf of two Roma women who were ejected from a bus.

Social welfare checks

FLAC is also concerned that the legal case for social welfare checks on Roma departing the country has not been established, Sinead Lucey said.

In a case which FLAC said pre-echoed the current controversy about the practice of airport checking of PUP social welfare recipients, it also represented a man with literacy problems, who does not speak English.

He was stopped at Dublin Airport and asked to sign a statement to the effect that he is not resident in the State and wished to withdraw his disability allowance claims.

An assessed social welfare overpayment against him was reduced by approximately €85,000.

“We know that this is only the tip of the iceberg in relation to the experience of discrimination by the Roma community. Much more needs to be done to combat such discrimination," Sinead Lucey said.

“This includes educating individuals in how they can seek redress for such discrimination, providing legal aid in respect of such discrimination claims, which isn’t currently available, and considering whether our equality legislation is actually adequate to provide redress for this form of ‘intersectional discrimination’ as it doesn’t fall neatly within the parameters of either the gender, or the race ground,” she said.

Concerns 

FLAC said it continues to raise concerns that legislation is being invoked on a routine basis by local authorities to threaten Traveller families with evictions “without consultation with the families concerned and without any safeguards against arbitrary eviction”.

“COVID-19 has thrown into sharp relief FLAC’s objectives; that people have a floor of basic rights and fair procedures in relation to areas like social welfare, housing, debt and employment; that people have access to information, legal advice and advocacy about those rights and that people are in a position to access those rights,” Eilis Barry said.

580 volunteer lawyers

The report shows that 26,995 received legal information or advice from FLAC last year, with 14,526 receiving basic legal advice from around 580 volunteer lawyers at FLAC’s clinics in 72 locations.

The main queries related to family and employment law.

Cases highlighted in the report include one where a hotel was ordered to pay €5,000 to a Traveller family after it had cancelled a booking to celebrate a first Holy Communion.

In another case, a man who had his claim for disability allowance refused had to wait 18 months from the time of referral for investigation to oral hearing and ultimately a successful decision.

During that time, he was not in receipt of any social welfare payment and was dependent on charity for support.