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Discrimination and the Roma community, 2015
1
Cases of discrimination in access to goods and services
1.
Granada.
Access to goods and services.
Direct discrimination.
A young Roma man contacted the FSG office
in Granada to report a situation he considered discriminatory.
The man said that he was taking a walk around the city centre and decided to enter a discotheque but the
doormen wouldn’t let him go inside and said: “No Gypsies allowed here.” He asked for a complaint form and filed
a complaint against the place. The person responsible for the disco who happened to see what was going on
apologised on behalf of the private security officers.
However, the young man felt that he had been deceived because a little while later he was again refused entry
at the same place for being Roma.
He decided not to return to that place because he felt that the discrimination against Roma on the part of the
owner and the security officers was not going to change.
This sort of resignation in the face of discrimination and acceptance of it as “normal behaviour” prevents anything
being done in the vast majority of cases. Victims typically do not want to take any sort of action.
2.
Almeria.
Access to goods and services.
Direct discrimination.
A young Roma couple approached the FSG office in Almeria to report a case of discrimination in access to
goods and services, specifically access to a discotheque. They recounted the following story:
“My girlfriend and I went to a well-known discotheque in Aguadulce (Almeria). They refused to let us in
(we’re both dark-skinned Roma) and we requested a complaint sheet and they refused. We called the
local police who ordered them to give us a complaint sheet to fill out and they did. When we got home,
we found some information about the pub and saw that they were not complying with regulations.
This incident of discrimination was published in the provincial newspaper La Voz de Almeria where the young
couple described the discriminatory treatment they had received and complained that they continue to be
treated poorly by the town hall of Roquetas de Mar as this was not the first time something like this had hap-
pened to them. We informed them that they could lodge an official complaint at the Roquetas town hall but
they replied that it wasn’t worth the trouble “because they didn’t think it would make any difference and they
believed that they would always be discriminated against in many places for being Roma”.
3.
Granada.
Access to goods and services.
Direct discrimination.
FSG workers from the Granada office in-
formed us that they received a complaint from a Roma man about discriminatory treatment against young Roma
every day at entertainment sites in Motril, province of Granada.
Several of us from the Department met with the person who made the complaint to help him inform the young
people in question about what to do in these cases, how to exercise their rights as citizens and potential cus-
tomers and about the duties of business establishments, i.e. comply with posted opening hours and treat cus-
tomers with respect which includes not discriminating against anyone.
Unfortunately, we have observed that situations such as this are quite common, i.e. young Roma being turned
away from entertainment activities simply because they are Roma.
4.
Jaen.
Access to goods and services.
Direct discrimination.
An FSG worker from the Jaen office reported that
the head of an association that distributed food for people in risk of social exclusion refused to provide food to
the local Roma families. He claimed that the reason was for fear of the “call effect”.