The Roma Flag will be flying over County Hall this weekend and on Monday in commemoration of the deaths of the 23,000 Roma and Sinti murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Of the men, women and children collected up and sent to the concentration camp 20,000 were murdered and the final 2,897 went to the gas chambers on 2 August, during the Night of the Gypsies. 2 August is when Romany people from across the world gather to remember the Roma and Sinti people, who were targeted by the Nazis during the Second World War. More than 200,00 Roma and Sinti were murdered or died as a result of starvation or disease. Many more were imprisoned, used as forced labour or subject to forced sterilisation and medical experimentation.
The wider Gypsy and Traveller community are our largest ethnic minority in rural Dorset.
The Roma heritage can be traced way back to North India from where they fled due to persecution and moved across Europe, including to what is now the UK. During Elizabethan times their very existence was a crime punishable by death and in Stuart times they were hunted as prey. In more recent years Gypsies worked as itinerant and settled farm labourers in our county, plus travelling and earning money from the crafts we associate with them… peg making, selling flowers, making wreaths and mending tin goods hence being “tinkers”.
It saddens me that even today Roma people working in professional roles dare not admit to their heritage because of prejudice against them. Gypsy and Traveller communities face some of the most severe health inequalities and poor life outcomes amongst the United Kingdom population, with estimations of life expectancies of between 10 and 25 years shorter than the general population; accommodation insecurity, low community participation and discrimination all contribute to this.
On Monday, along with the Lord Lieutenant and High Sheriff of Dorset I will be attending a Holocaust Memorial Service at Kingston Maurward organised by Kushti Bok (“good luck”), the Gypsy and Traveller led local organisation. The poignant service is an opportunity to reflect on the horrors of history but to also acknowledge the prejudice and discrimination Gypsies and Travellers still face today.
Pauline Batstone – Chairman of Dorset Council
