Report on Traveller segregation dismissed as ‘rubbish’

A study on Rathkeale, claiming the Co Limerick town has its own form of apartheid due to the divide between Travellers and the settled community, has been dismissed by community leaders as “total rubbish”.

It is estimated up to 50% of Rathkeale’s year-round population of about 1,800 is made up of settled Travellers.

Over the Christmas-New Year period the population swells to almost 5,000 due to the influx of transient Travellers from all over Europe.