Together with our partners in the Suicide Prevention Consortium we have been exploring suicide and stigma with New Travellers.
This is part of a blog series where we have explored this topic with different communities.
New Travellers is a term often used to describe people from all walks of life who have chosen to live nomadically. However, the term is also used to specifically describe the New Traveller community born through the free festival movement in the 1960s and onwards. There are now people born into 3rd and 4th generations of families who follow what is now known as the New Traveller way of life.
There are no national statistics as to the number of New Travellers living within England, nor any data related to suicide for these communities. A 2023 report from Friends, Families and Travellers highlights that their casework indicates a disproportionally high prevalence of suicide amongst the communities they work with, this includes New Travellers.
We spoke with a New Traveller about suicide and stigma in their community.
We heard that there are real concerns about the negative beliefs and stigmas around the New Traveller community and the impact this has on people within the community. This person highlights education as key to addressing stigma that surrounds their community.
For this project we worked with Friends, Families Travellers. They are a national charity that works to end racism and discrimination against Gypsy, Roma and Traveller people and to protect the right to pursue a nomadic way of life. To find out more about this organisation visit https://www.gypsy-traveller.org/