Dale Farm eviction “will weigh heavily on Britain”

Eviction described as brutal and illegal by human rights observers.

Early this morning riot police and bailiffs stormed the Dale Farm community in a dawn raid. Police violated the court order and used sledgehammers to smash through the walls of a fully legal plot on the site in order to force entry. Human rights observers reported several injuries of residents and supporters from police action as they forced their way onto site.

Police are using tasers on those protesting the eviction.
Residents and supporters remain inside the site, many locked on to blockades and caravans together in order to resist the eviction. Police breached the perimeter to initiate the eviction.

Kathleen McCarthy, a Dale Farm resident, said:
“The memory of Dale Farm will weigh heavily on Britain for generations- we are being dragged out of the only homes we have in this world. Our entire community is being ripped apart by Basildon Council and the politicians in government”

Natalie Fox, a supporter said:
“The Traveller community is being criminalised- it has been made illegal for them to travel, but they are not being allowed to settle. If Traveller families are not allowed to make their home on a former scrapyard, then where will they be allowed to live?”

Lily Hayes, a human rights observer, said:
“Basildon Council are violating the court order by smashing in the walls of a fully legal plot on the Dale Farm site. They are also acting unnecessarily brutally, using tasers on people protesting the eviction”