So they buy a piece of land, fence it off, install a septic tank and connect the utilities. It is their property. So what if they haven’t got authorisation from the planning commissars, it has no immediate neighbouring residential property. This is not a case of illegal squatting. They have just done a bit of green belt development, something the government says we will increasingly have to accept. Good luck to ’em.

As for Tessa Jowell’s husband David Mills complaining that the gypsies broke the planning rules – he is one to talk about law breaking…