As a family of 14 gypsies face eviction for terrorising their neighbours and wrecking the £1.2m home where they live on benefits, will they trash YOUR street next?
Given the public’s current *fascination with all things gypsy, stardom could be beckoning for the O’Leary family, of North *London.
Not only are there enough of them (14, with another on the way) to provide material for an entire *follow-up series to Channel 4’s hit My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, but there is *sufficient bling to mesmerise any audience.
Expectant mother Tanya, who already has five sons and seven daughters, recently bought a new crib for the forthcoming arrival — costing a jaw-dropping £1,100. It’s made of 50 yards of ruched baby-pink silk and decorated with 1,000 crystals and dozens of satin roses.
Add in a £250 matching Moses basket and the coach-built pink pram ‘fit for a princess’, and My Big Fat Gypsy Nursery could soon be heading to a screen near you.
More...
* 'My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding has made us a laughing stock': Woman blasts C4's portrayal of traveller life
The only problem is that, as is also the case with those featured on the current Channel 4 show, the lifestyle of the O’Leary family raises far more *questions than it actually answers.
First and foremost, how on earth can a mother of 12 afford such extravagances?
It appears that neither 39-year-old Tanya or her long-term partner Tom, 42, has a job. Instead, their family is entirely supported by the state.
They get child benefits worth £700 a month, and jobseeker’s allowance and council tax relief bring in the same again.
For a family of this size, it might be assumed that finding a house big enough for their brood would leave no change for luxuries.
They live in Muswell Hill — one of the most *exclusive corners of the capital — in a five-bed semi that should be worth £1.2 million. Rent would cost them £4,000 a month. But, because the house is owned by the council, the O’Learys’ pay just a *fraction of the market rent.
The natural assumption is that they might in some way be grateful for the state’s largesse (their subsidised house and benefits equate to £70,000 a year).
But the opposite is in fact true. Earlier this week it emerged that for the past 15 months, the O’Learys have been making their neighbours’ lives a living hell.
They have allegedly thrown beer cans, flower pots and broken glass over fences. They have yelled abuse at fellow residents, calling them ‘rich b*****ds’.
And they have apparently dumped used toilet paper in neighbours’ properties. As for their house and garden, these have been completely trashed.
Shocking stuff. But what is perhaps more *shocking still is the fact that it isn’t the first time that the O’Learys have done this. The Mail can reveal they left their previous council house in an even worse state.
Such was the damage that it cost £15,000 to fix it again. Again, the family apparently terrorised their neighbours, hurling threats, stones and abuse at anyone who dared cross them.
Squalor: The family have lived in the five bedroom, £1.2 million house for the past 15 months
Nonetheless, the handouts from the council and the state have continued. And, like some over-indulged child, so too has the bad behaviour.
It’s important to recognise that the complaint against the O’Learys is that they are nuisance neighbours. That they are gypsies should be neither here nor there.
But, the fact they come from travelling stock is a point the family makes at every turn.
Indeed Tanya Walsh (the couple are understood to be married, but she uses her maiden name) has even used it as an excuse to explain the state of their house.
‘I just wish they would find a caravan site for me to move to, so I wouldn’t have to live beside my neighbours,’ she said last week. ‘That would be heaven. The council have not given us any furniture and are slow to carry out repairs. They don’t have the money to help travellers since David Cameron got into government.’
A quick search on the internet makes it clear Tanya leaves no room for doubt about the weight she puts on her heritage.
On the social networking site Bebo, she gives her nickname as ‘Gypsie T’. Her home page carries a picture of the ‘Just Do It’ logo of sportswear giant Nike. Beneath it she has written: ‘Pikeys Just Nick It!!!!’
She also states that she is addicted to ‘eating chocolate and having babies’.
Profile: Tanya Walsh gives herself the nickname of Gypsie T on her Bebo page
Over on online auction site eBay, unemployed Tanya has also been busy.
As well as shelling out £1,000-plus for the world’s most over-the-top crib, she’s also splashed out on dozens of items of Royal Crown Derby china, shoes, a vintage pink babydoll nightie and an Art Deco Romany *fortune-*telling tea-cup, complete with instructions.
Her eBay profile reads as follows: ‘Ime a proud mum who formes part of the Irish travelling community; of wich I am veary pleased to be part off . . . I just love travelling!’
But a skim through records show she has never travelled far.
Born in hospital in North London, Tanya Welch is the daughter of a van driver called Peter, of Wood Green.
The eldest of seven children, she attended Kingsmead School in Enfield, where her misbehaviour often saw her in trouble with the headmaster.
At some time in the early Nineties she met partner Thomas O’Leary, originally from Ireland and then working as a scrap dealer.
They had their first child, a boy, in 1994 after which children arrived in 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2009 and 2010. All were born in London. Their *second child, a daughter, died aged one.
During the past 15 years, the *family has lived at more than ten different addresses in North *London. The majority, if not all, of these *properties were provided by Haringey Borough Council.
Of those, it’s understood that one burned down. It is known they were evicted from at least one other, a four-bed terrace in a quiet *residential road to the north of Finsbury Park.
Nuisance neighbour: Miss Walsh has said that she would much rather live in a caravan and have no neighbours
They moved into the property, which was privately-owned but leased to the council for five years, in 2006. During the four years the O’Learys lived there they wrecked the house and the lives of those *living nearby.
‘One day I spotted them throwing a ball against our front door. The door was made of glass so I was worried it might smash,’ said one former neighbour, who asked not to be named.
‘I told them to go away, and after that we seemed to become targets.
‘One of the children looked into my eyes and told me they were going to get their little brother to s*** on my front porch.’
It was a threat they would carry through, as well as throwing rotten fruit at the neighbour.
They would also shout at the man, *calling him a paedophile and ridiculing his weight; chanting ‘who ate all the pies’.
He added: ‘They were terrifying. It’s really embarrassing to say that because they are just children, but I used to dread coming home and seeing them.
‘The father at least tried to tell them off, but the mother didn’t give a damn. They used to throw rocks at us when we were sitting outside in our garden — they were just terrible.
‘We called the police a few times, but when they came the kids would climb on the roof and hide. The officers told us there simply wasn’t much they could do.’
Another neighbour, a 25-year-old man, said one of the children threatened to throw a knife at him when he was in his garden.
‘They were out of control,’ he said. ‘They would climb my fence and the little ones would climb under my fence and rip up the *garden.
They used to throw *rubbish into the garden, too, and I once saw nappies thrown over.
‘There were always children *coming in and out. They were very noisy. One baby would start crying, then another would start crying; then they would all be crying.’
Eventually, after numerous *complaints to the council, the *family was evicted. The owner of the property, who again asked not to be identified, was stunned to discover what they left (or rather, hadn’t) in their wake.
‘The furniture had gone, beds, couches, everything,’ he told me.
‘In the kitchen there was *nothing left, only the four walls. ‘The toilet was still there, but it was broken and cracked and so was the bath.
‘The boiler had gone and so had the radiators and the plaster had been pulled off the walls.
‘The doors had been smashed and all the windows were broken.
‘The house was like a cow-shed, it was diabolical — the worst I have seen in 25 years as a landlord.’
And the garden was no better: ‘It was full of rubbish and tyres and looked like it had been ploughed’.
Having put right the damage at a cost of some £15,000, the landlord decided to sell the house rather than rent it out.
‘The neighbours told me if I let it to the council again, I’d better not drive down the street or show my face,’ he said.
Incredible though it may seem, the O’Learys apparently *suffered no retribution for what happened to that house.
Instead, the same council would hand them the keys to an even more desirable property, the house in Muswell Hill where they are *currently living. And, surprise, *surprise, exactly the same thing appears to have happened there.
A reporter who was shown around the property earlier this week described how ceilings had *collapsed, paint had been stripped off walls and electric sockets were hanging loose.
The floors were filthy, as the *children had rode shiny new *bicycles around the corridors. Meanwhile the garden was piled high with dumped fire extinguishers, *mattresses and rubble.
And, also as before, the *neighbours have been suffering. Their *complaints to the council and to the police include littering, barking dogs, late-night rows and other anti-social behaviour.
One neighbour said: ‘We feel really vulnerable. I’ve called the council to complain of young children unattended and naked in the street — but they seem to do nothing.’
Another told me: ‘I would love to give you all the stories about the family. But we are their neighbours and it could cause trouble.’
In her defence, Tanya admitted that she had lost count of the number of times police had visited her; but said accusations she neglected her children were ‘a lie’.
She said her dream would be to live full-time in the countryside in a caravan they own and which they use every summer. ‘That’s heaven,’ she said, ‘though we do get moved on a lot.’
And last night it emerged that they were about to be moved on again.
A spokeswoman for *Haringey Council told me they had now served a notice on the family, *seeking *possession of the property.
If they do not leave, then the *council will go to court to evict them.
But she added that they ‘were urgently deciding what further action is needed, given that we have a legal duty of care to the children’.
In practice, that means that even when they do eventually get the O’Learys out, they will only have to find them somewhere else to live — and another set of neighbours to terrorise.
Given the public’s current *fascination with all things gypsy, stardom could be beckoning for the O’Leary family, of North *London.
Not only are there enough of them (14, with another on the way) to provide material for an entire *follow-up series to Channel 4’s hit My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, but there is *sufficient bling to mesmerise any audience.
Expectant mother Tanya, who already has five sons and seven daughters, recently bought a new crib for the forthcoming arrival — costing a jaw-dropping £1,100. It’s made of 50 yards of ruched baby-pink silk and decorated with 1,000 crystals and dozens of satin roses.
Add in a £250 matching Moses basket and the coach-built pink pram ‘fit for a princess’, and My Big Fat Gypsy Nursery could soon be heading to a screen near you.
More...
* 'My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding has made us a laughing stock': Woman blasts C4's portrayal of traveller life
The only problem is that, as is also the case with those featured on the current Channel 4 show, the lifestyle of the O’Leary family raises far more *questions than it actually answers.
First and foremost, how on earth can a mother of 12 afford such extravagances?
It appears that neither 39-year-old Tanya or her long-term partner Tom, 42, has a job. Instead, their family is entirely supported by the state.
They get child benefits worth £700 a month, and jobseeker’s allowance and council tax relief bring in the same again.
For a family of this size, it might be assumed that finding a house big enough for their brood would leave no change for luxuries.
They live in Muswell Hill — one of the most *exclusive corners of the capital — in a five-bed semi that should be worth £1.2 million. Rent would cost them £4,000 a month. But, because the house is owned by the council, the O’Learys’ pay just a *fraction of the market rent.
The natural assumption is that they might in some way be grateful for the state’s largesse (their subsidised house and benefits equate to £70,000 a year).
But the opposite is in fact true. Earlier this week it emerged that for the past 15 months, the O’Learys have been making their neighbours’ lives a living hell.
They have allegedly thrown beer cans, flower pots and broken glass over fences. They have yelled abuse at fellow residents, calling them ‘rich b*****ds’.
And they have apparently dumped used toilet paper in neighbours’ properties. As for their house and garden, these have been completely trashed.
Shocking stuff. But what is perhaps more *shocking still is the fact that it isn’t the first time that the O’Learys have done this. The Mail can reveal they left their previous council house in an even worse state.
Such was the damage that it cost £15,000 to fix it again. Again, the family apparently terrorised their neighbours, hurling threats, stones and abuse at anyone who dared cross them.
Squalor: The family have lived in the five bedroom, £1.2 million house for the past 15 months
Nonetheless, the handouts from the council and the state have continued. And, like some over-indulged child, so too has the bad behaviour.
It’s important to recognise that the complaint against the O’Learys is that they are nuisance neighbours. That they are gypsies should be neither here nor there.
But, the fact they come from travelling stock is a point the family makes at every turn.
Indeed Tanya Walsh (the couple are understood to be married, but she uses her maiden name) has even used it as an excuse to explain the state of their house.
‘I just wish they would find a caravan site for me to move to, so I wouldn’t have to live beside my neighbours,’ she said last week. ‘That would be heaven. The council have not given us any furniture and are slow to carry out repairs. They don’t have the money to help travellers since David Cameron got into government.’
A quick search on the internet makes it clear Tanya leaves no room for doubt about the weight she puts on her heritage.
On the social networking site Bebo, she gives her nickname as ‘Gypsie T’. Her home page carries a picture of the ‘Just Do It’ logo of sportswear giant Nike. Beneath it she has written: ‘Pikeys Just Nick It!!!!’
She also states that she is addicted to ‘eating chocolate and having babies’.
Profile: Tanya Walsh gives herself the nickname of Gypsie T on her Bebo page
Over on online auction site eBay, unemployed Tanya has also been busy.
As well as shelling out £1,000-plus for the world’s most over-the-top crib, she’s also splashed out on dozens of items of Royal Crown Derby china, shoes, a vintage pink babydoll nightie and an Art Deco Romany *fortune-*telling tea-cup, complete with instructions.
Her eBay profile reads as follows: ‘Ime a proud mum who formes part of the Irish travelling community; of wich I am veary pleased to be part off . . . I just love travelling!’
But a skim through records show she has never travelled far.
Born in hospital in North London, Tanya Welch is the daughter of a van driver called Peter, of Wood Green.
The eldest of seven children, she attended Kingsmead School in Enfield, where her misbehaviour often saw her in trouble with the headmaster.
At some time in the early Nineties she met partner Thomas O’Leary, originally from Ireland and then working as a scrap dealer.
They had their first child, a boy, in 1994 after which children arrived in 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2009 and 2010. All were born in London. Their *second child, a daughter, died aged one.
During the past 15 years, the *family has lived at more than ten different addresses in North *London. The majority, if not all, of these *properties were provided by Haringey Borough Council.
Of those, it’s understood that one burned down. It is known they were evicted from at least one other, a four-bed terrace in a quiet *residential road to the north of Finsbury Park.
Nuisance neighbour: Miss Walsh has said that she would much rather live in a caravan and have no neighbours
They moved into the property, which was privately-owned but leased to the council for five years, in 2006. During the four years the O’Learys lived there they wrecked the house and the lives of those *living nearby.
‘One day I spotted them throwing a ball against our front door. The door was made of glass so I was worried it might smash,’ said one former neighbour, who asked not to be named.
‘I told them to go away, and after that we seemed to become targets.
‘One of the children looked into my eyes and told me they were going to get their little brother to s*** on my front porch.’
It was a threat they would carry through, as well as throwing rotten fruit at the neighbour.
They would also shout at the man, *calling him a paedophile and ridiculing his weight; chanting ‘who ate all the pies’.
He added: ‘They were terrifying. It’s really embarrassing to say that because they are just children, but I used to dread coming home and seeing them.
‘The father at least tried to tell them off, but the mother didn’t give a damn. They used to throw rocks at us when we were sitting outside in our garden — they were just terrible.
‘We called the police a few times, but when they came the kids would climb on the roof and hide. The officers told us there simply wasn’t much they could do.’
Another neighbour, a 25-year-old man, said one of the children threatened to throw a knife at him when he was in his garden.
‘They were out of control,’ he said. ‘They would climb my fence and the little ones would climb under my fence and rip up the *garden.
They used to throw *rubbish into the garden, too, and I once saw nappies thrown over.
‘There were always children *coming in and out. They were very noisy. One baby would start crying, then another would start crying; then they would all be crying.’
Eventually, after numerous *complaints to the council, the *family was evicted. The owner of the property, who again asked not to be identified, was stunned to discover what they left (or rather, hadn’t) in their wake.
‘The furniture had gone, beds, couches, everything,’ he told me.
‘In the kitchen there was *nothing left, only the four walls. ‘The toilet was still there, but it was broken and cracked and so was the bath.
‘The boiler had gone and so had the radiators and the plaster had been pulled off the walls.
‘The doors had been smashed and all the windows were broken.
‘The house was like a cow-shed, it was diabolical — the worst I have seen in 25 years as a landlord.’
And the garden was no better: ‘It was full of rubbish and tyres and looked like it had been ploughed’.
Having put right the damage at a cost of some £15,000, the landlord decided to sell the house rather than rent it out.
‘The neighbours told me if I let it to the council again, I’d better not drive down the street or show my face,’ he said.
Incredible though it may seem, the O’Learys apparently *suffered no retribution for what happened to that house.
Instead, the same council would hand them the keys to an even more desirable property, the house in Muswell Hill where they are *currently living. And, surprise, *surprise, exactly the same thing appears to have happened there.
A reporter who was shown around the property earlier this week described how ceilings had *collapsed, paint had been stripped off walls and electric sockets were hanging loose.
The floors were filthy, as the *children had rode shiny new *bicycles around the corridors. Meanwhile the garden was piled high with dumped fire extinguishers, *mattresses and rubble.
And, also as before, the *neighbours have been suffering. Their *complaints to the council and to the police include littering, barking dogs, late-night rows and other anti-social behaviour.
One neighbour said: ‘We feel really vulnerable. I’ve called the council to complain of young children unattended and naked in the street — but they seem to do nothing.’
Another told me: ‘I would love to give you all the stories about the family. But we are their neighbours and it could cause trouble.’
In her defence, Tanya admitted that she had lost count of the number of times police had visited her; but said accusations she neglected her children were ‘a lie’.
She said her dream would be to live full-time in the countryside in a caravan they own and which they use every summer. ‘That’s heaven,’ she said, ‘though we do get moved on a lot.’
And last night it emerged that they were about to be moved on again.
A spokeswoman for *Haringey Council told me they had now served a notice on the family, *seeking *possession of the property.
If they do not leave, then the *council will go to court to evict them.
But she added that they ‘were urgently deciding what further action is needed, given that we have a legal duty of care to the children’.
In practice, that means that even when they do eventually get the O’Learys out, they will only have to find them somewhere else to live — and another set of neighbours to terrorise.
