Stormont’s treatment of Irish language slammed

Posted by Jim on January 18, 2014

 

 The Council of Europe has accused the Stormont administration of

blocking the growth and promotion of the Irish language in the north of

Ireland.

 

It said hostile attitudes by government officials were preventing its

use in the courts and in education, and warned that Stormont was also in

breach of a charter of rights because of delays and attempts to block

requests for bilingual street names.

 

One unionist councillor in county Fermanagh recently described the Irish

language as ‘foreign and gnomish’ and, in a leaked e-mail, vowed to

fight the “introduction” of Irish to Enniskillen — a town whose name

was anglicised in the 17th century from the Irish ‘Inis Ceithleann’.

 

The European review of minority languages also said the British

government has not been able to justify banning the use of Irish in the

courts, or allowing people to take citizenship tests through the

language.

 

The Council of Europe criticised attitudes to Irish in some official

circles and what it said is the Stormont Assembly’s “persisting hostile

climate”.

 

Caral Ni Chuilin, Minister for Culture, Arts and Leisure who is

responsible for overall promotion of the language, said she hoped this

would change.

 

But she pointed out any change to policy on languages in the north of

Ireland requires the agreement of the Executive and Assembly, ands is

therefore subject to a unionist veto.

 

“I hope that all supporters of the Irish language will work together to

convince the Executive, the Assembly and all our people of the merits of

supporting an Irish Language Act,” she said.

 

The review team hit out at the lack of the long-awaited Irish Language

Act, originally agreed as part of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement;

Irish-medium pre-schools; primary education in Irish; and free school

transport for Irish language schools, despite a recent judicial review

case against the Department of Education on the issue.

 

COMMISSIONER RESIGNS

 

Meanwhile, in the 26 Counties, a nationwide campaign to address the

Dublin government’s failure to provide ongoing support for the Irish

language is due to be launched in the coming weeks.

 

Over 200 people attended a public meeting in Dublin recently organised

by Conradh na Gaeilge in response to the resignation last month of an

Commisineir Teanga Sean O Cuirreain.

 

The meeting heard that Mr O Cuirreain quit his position in protest at

the failure by the Dublin government to implement legislation designed

to improve services to the public through Irish.

 

“Sean O Cuirreain’s resignation has really galvanised people – there is

a real sense of crisis that needs to be addressed,” said Conradh na

Gaeilge general secretary, Julian de Spainn.

 

ANTI-GAELIC RACISM

 

And in a bizarre development, a Glasgow private hire driver refused to

allow visitors to speak Irish Gaelic in his car — even though Gaelic is

also a native language in Scotland.

 

The man, who has not been named, reportedly threw the Donegal visitors

out at the side of the road at 2am after they objected to his demand

that they stop speaking in Irish.

 

Kathleen McAleer, a local mental health nurse, said her cousins were

talking to each other in Gaelic, which is their first language. “The

taxi driver turned around and said to them ‘Stop speaking in that

language’. We didn’t really know how to take it. He said: ‘When you are

in Britain, it is English you speak.’

 

“I said to the driver ‘Excuse me’, shocked that somebody would say that

to them. I said: ‘That is out of order’. He then said: ‘If they want to

speak in that language they can get out of my taxi.’ So we got out and

said we wouldn’t pay.”

 

The driver is currently under investigation under hate legislation.