Ministers’ criticism of comedian at odds with planned laws harmful to Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, leaders say
Members of the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller community have accused the government of hypocrisy after ministers condemned a Holocaust joke by Jimmy Carr while pushing through a raft of legislation hostile to their way of life.
The Traveller Movement, which represents the GRT community, said it had been “surprised” by the government’s promises to better protect the community against hate speech following the backlash to Carr’s joke, in which he said the genocide of Romani and Sinti gypsies in the Holocaust is ignored because people don’t want to “focus on the positives”.
Greg Sproston, policy and campaigns manager for the Traveller Movement, said the government was currently trying to pass three bills – on policing, nationality and borders and elections – all of which will “have disproportionately negative impacts” on the GRT community. He added that a national strategy to reduce inequality in the community announced over two years ago “still has not materialised”.
“If the government is serious about protecting and supporting these communities, they would scrap this discriminatory legislation and bring forward the strategy without delay,” he said.