In Govanhill, a little network of streets and avenues on Glasgow’s South Side, the besmirching of another immigrant community is in full spate. A century ago, it was the poor Irish, fleeing famine and persecution by the British government, who were being demonised. Now it’s the turn of the Roma people. Britain’s largest concentration of Roma families resides in Glasgow, where they began to settle in numbers following the 2004 expansion of the EU.

The Roma community, mainly from Romania, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, were among those who took advantage of free movement. They are a travelling people and are among the world’s most persecuted minorities. They have always provided an easy target for the hard right in any country where they settle. When widespread social inequality prevails, the presence of any minority provides an opportunity for reactionaries to camouflage its real causes.

The Irish who settled in the UK brought with them the old, reviled faith and a perceived economic threat to the livelihoods of indigenous working-class families. In the popular culture of the day, they were depicted as unclean, savage and given to base desires; they were regarded as something less than human. In a remarkably short space of time, however, their own work ethic and the compassion of ordinary Scots allowed them to express themselves and eventually to thrive and to make a massive contribution to Scotland’s economy and culture.

A generation later, the streets of Govanhill and neighbouring districts such as Queens Park, Pollokshaws and Pollokshields became home to thousands of Asian families, mainly of Pakistani origin. They, too, encountered some discrimination, but this was more muted and a sullen acceptance soon gave way to outright affection. The universalism and compassionate ideals of a postwar Labour government, combined with Britain’s need to rebuild, led to this community’s rapid integration into Scottish society.

The relationship between Glasgow’s 21st-century Roma and the community in Govanhill is significantly more complicated. This is a people accustomed to living on the margins of society and wearily familiar with the lexicon of alienation and loathing that accompanies them on their travels. This has bred in them a suspicion and resentment of authority and a spirit of stubborn self-reliance. As such, many of their children pass into adulthood without anything resembling a formal education.

In Glasgow, through the blessed efforts of primary schools, these barriers are daily being broken down. Teachers are reaching out to this community and not only to its children. Parents who have little or no English are being encouraged to participate in the activities of the schools and in the education of their children. This has not gone unnoticed in other European cities where the Roma have settled. Thus, the Glasgow approach has been heralded as the gold standard in helping this people to feel a sense of belonging rather than being endured and marginalised.

However, in recent weeks, the Roma have been subject to fresh and troubling scrutiny. A newspaper report short on fact and heavy on insinuation claimed that there was widespread evidence of Roma families selling their children into prostitution. The lurid tales fed on unsubstantiated claims from nameless individuals that have been whispered in the area for a decade or so. The police and Glasgow city council have been aware of these claims, too, but insist that they have never received any information worthy of investigation.

The furore that ensued when these claims were given fresh credence led to both organisations pledging to redouble their efforts to track down any evidence of such crimes.

The shocking child sex abuse claims sit at the apex of a collection of social evils, steadily escalating by degrees of luridness, which have been blamed on the Roma. These range from tenement back courts being deployed as fly-tipping areas to tales of a crime wave caused by rampaging Roma youth.

When I lived in Govanhill in the 1980s, it was a vibrant, working-class neighbourhood that thrummed with the voices and colours of a dozen ethnic peoples. Now, some streets have been annexed by dodgy landlords who have preyed on the incoming Roma with some tenement dwellings housing up to 20 people. I have been back there many times and to label the area a slum, notwithstanding the overcrowding, is grievously to distort the reality.

In recent months, some joint initiatives between the city council and Holyrood have begun to make headway in loosening the grip of predatory landlords. Several have been barred from the landlord register and the council has begun to impose higher standards of regulation on landlords operating within the area. Funding amounting to £4.3m over three years has been put in place to implement an acquisition and repair programme where the housing association will take ownership of properties acquired to let for a social rent.

The recent child sex abuse claims, shocking as they are, also require some scrutiny. Some of the responses accompanying stories about the Roma are utterly devoid of any compassion and replete with the language of Ukip and Britain First. This led police chiefs to warn some about the “need to be very careful about the language they are using”.

Much of the outrage purports to be concerned about issues of child welfare and a sudden burst of compassion for “our own poor”, where none existed before. It ignores the fact of child welfare issues in the indigenous white communities in other parts of the city. .

There are good things happening in Govanhill, similar to those that are taking place in other communities that have been enriched by the shared experiences of ethnic minorities. Certainly, the claims of child sex abuse, no matter how threadbare, need to be investigated. Let’s just hope that these are not merely being used to mask something sinister.