Travellers' camp site 'is legal'

The Welsh Assembly Government has announced £1.5m for traveller sites

Residents have expressed concern after travellers set up a camp site without any notification on land the group own near Wrexham.

The six families moved onto the land at Rossett at the start of last week's bank holiday and began work without planning permission.

The group admitted timing their move to give them more chance to get work done before officials could intervene.

Wrexham council said the camp was unauthorised, but not illegal.

The group bought the land last year, but did not do anything with it until the bank holiday weekend.

Rossett councillor Robert Shepherd told BBC Wales everything had happened very quickly.

We're not as bad as they think we are Lisa Norsher

"It seemed a very organised set-up altogether," he said.

"It happened the Friday before the bank holiday started and the first I heard about it was just after lunchtime.

"Within a couple of hours, they'd put a load of hardcore [stone] down and some caravans already on site.

"There was an extra day's work, to get organised before people returned to work on the Tuesday.

'Amazed, upset'

"I think people were amazed, upset, concerned."

Lisa Norsher, a mother-of-five on the site, said her family had tried to live in a house but it "didn't work with the kids".

"They go outside to play after school and they get called names - gypsy, gyppo, stinker," she said.

"Then they are coming in to me, 'Mam, what's a gypsy?' and all this. They're broken-hearted then, and I have to sit them down and explain what it means.

"[We're going to] stay in a caravan all the time and people [can] get to know us and how we live.

"We're not as bad as they think we are."

Mrs Norsher said other temporary camps had been successful in the past.

"They put us on to solicitors who work with travellers and we phone them up and they say, 'yes, you have got rights'."

Wrexham council said the camp was not illegal, and had asked the group to apply for planning permission.

The travellers have said if the planning application is not successful, they plan to appeal, a process which can take a substantial amount of time.