JOINT DISSENTING OPINION OF JUDGES PASTOR RIDRUEJO, BONELLO, TULKENS, STRÁŽNICKÁ, LORENZEN, FISCHBACH AND CASADEVALL

1. We regret that we are unable to share the opinion of the majority that there has been no violation of Article 8 in this case. We refer to our joint dissenting opinion in the case of Chapman v. the United Kingdom (no. 27238, judgment of 18 January 2001), the leading case of the five applications brought before our Court concerning the problems experienced by gypsies in the United Kingdom.

2. Identical considerations arise in this application. The applicant and his family followed an itinerant lifestyle for many years, stopping on temporary or unofficial sites and being frequently moved on by police and local authority officials. Due to considerations of security and the education of his grandchildren, the applicant took the step of buying land on which to station his caravans. Planning permission was however refused for this and they were required to leave. He and his family remain on their land subject to the threat of further enforcement measures. His situation is insecure and vulnerable.

During the planning procedures it was acknowledged that there was a shortfall of official sites in the area. No available alternative site was identified where the applicant to go either in the district or in the county as a whole. The Government referred to the Inspector ’ s opinion that it was not unlikely that other sites might be available in the area. While the applicant was subsequently offered places on two official sites, he has submitted that these were unfit for habitation. It appears that the Broomfield site, next to a rubbish tip, has since been closed down. The Vauxhall site, next to a sewage works and a steelworks operating 24 hours a day, has only recently been refurbished. The applicant ’ s allegations that the level of noise was such as to interfere seriously with the sleep of site residents were substantiated by the fact that the Council has issued a Noise Abatement Notice against the steelworks.

The Government also said that the applicant was free to seek sites outside the county. It is apparent however that, notwithstanding the statistics relied on by the Government (see paragraph 55), there is still a significant shortfall of official, lawful sites available for gypsies in the country as a whole and that it cannot be taken for granted that vacancies exist or are available elsewhere.

3. Consequently, the measures taken to evict the applicant from his home on his own land, in circumstances where there has not been shown to be any other lawful, alternative site reasonably open to him, were, in our view, disproportionate and disclosed a violation of Article 8 of the Convention.

4. We voted for non-violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 and Article 14 as, in light of our firm conviction that Article 8 had been violated in the circumstances of this case, no separate issues remained to be examined.

SEPARATE OPINION OF JUDGE BONELLO

I refer to the terms of my separate opinion in the Chapman v. the United Kingdom judgment of this date.

[1] Notes by the Registry

. Protocol No. 11 came into force on 1 November 1998.

[2] . The full text of the Commission’s opinion and of the separate opinions contained in the report will be reproduced as an annex to the final printed version of the judgment (in the official reports of selected judgments and decisions of the Court), but in the meantime a copy of the Commission’s report is obtainable from the Registry.