Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
DESPITE BEING AN official language of the European Union, the Irish language does not have full parity in the European Parliament because of significant shortfalls in Irish interpretation and translation services.
MEP for Ireland South Sean Kelly has written to Education Minister Norma Foley and President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, calling for action following the extension of certain rules which exempt the parliament from having to fulfill all translation and interpretation requirements.
In the letters, he outlines measures which he believes will ensure Irish receives the same treatment as other official EU languages in the near future.
A fluent Irish speaker, he has called for a potential extension of memoranda of understanding with various Irish universities, including Queen’s University in Belfast.
He also proposed establishing targeted recruitment drives in Gaeltacht regions by the EP Liaison Office in Ireland, and expanding on remote working opportunities.
On his hope to have a new deal struck with Queen’s University, he said that Irish speakers in Northern Ireland face “significant ambiguity in recruitment processes”.
“We must establish clear guidelines to facilitate their entry into EU roles,” he explained. “The reality is we are missing an untapped resource when it comes to Irish speakers, if we want to elevate the language then we need to adjust existing recruitment structures.”
His call comes following a campaign during the election by broadcaster Síomha Ní Ruairc who, writing in The Journal, said that the new Parliament has a chance to change the status of the Irish language to represent the 2.2 million people in Ireland who have some level of Gaeilge.
Kelly said that the recent extension of the technical rules for Irish interpretation and translation services highlight a “pressing issue” that he believes necessitates a new course of action in the approach of the European Parliament (EP) towards the Irish language.
It is understood by The Journal that there are enough Irish translators working within the EP currently, but they haven’t been fully trained or qualified.
The EP said: “Despite sustained and continuous interinstitutional efforts and considerable progress, the number of qualified translators is still expected to be so limited as regards Irish that, for the foreseeable future, full coverage of that language under Rule 167 cannot be assured for documents other than legal acts of general application.”
Rule 167 dictates that all parliament’s documents are to be drawn up in the official languages, and all MEPs have the right to speak in parliament in the official language of their choice, with interpretation being provided into other official languages.
The exemption only applies to texts passed through the Parliament by MEPs. Admission forms, financial records, internal reviews, among other documents produced by the institutions themselves must still be translated.
The extension will last until the end of the next term – May 2029.
When Ireland joined the EEC, Gaeilge was a treaty language, which meant only the union’s treaties had to be translated into Gaeilge. This changed in 2007 when full working and official status was given to the language.
However, a derogation was granted by the Council of the EU at the time which meant not every official document had to be translated into Irish. This derogation ended in 2022.
With reporting by Muiris O’Cearbhaill.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Colonial imperialist terrorists doing what they do!
@joe moody: Protecting people from terrorists that planted bombs in Shops , Pubs , Restaurants, Hotels . They didn’t care who they killed .
@Jack Moss: Balkymurphy massacre, Derry Bloody Sunday hasn’t really covered your comrades in arms in Glory. Don’t try to come here and claim some sort of moral high ground while defending British forces in Ireland or rest of world. Your national is currently supplying the means of genocide in Palestine.
@Jack Moss: how is that protecting people? It could’ve damaged the peace process and cost people their lives
@North Phone Bowe: Your hero McGuinness and his Derry brigade murdered 51 innocent from the Derry area . 28 of them Catholics . People like Catholic teen Kathleen Feeney shot through the head by the IRA . Spares us your crocodile tears for those killed on Bloody Sunday .
@Jack Moss: shankill butchers , loyalist collusion…etc etc.. U LOL crew only see one side always and it’s orange
@Pork Hunt: Nobody defends/ justifies the murders committed by loyalist terrorists though. It’s only Provo supporters who seem to forget that the Provos murdered more Catholics than the British Army during the Troubles. Revisionism is good business these days. I don’t forget the poll carried out at the end of the Troubles that showed both Catholics and Protestants in the high 80s% say there was no justification for the terrorism committed in their name.
@honey badger: it’s not surprising to see you in support of a brutal apartheid occupying force.
Both the IRA and Hamas have done heinous things, for sure but both of them are a result of unjust suppression and disenfranchisement of people, illegally. Neither of them grew in a vacuum.
If you brutally push people down, they will rise up with whatever means they have at their disposal. I’ve no doubt that Palestinians would love to face Israel down with a conventional army but Israel has seen to it that that can’t happen. You reap what you sow.
@Soundy Sound: Lovely word salad and whataboutery. What “unjust suppression, disenfranchisement, illegally” were the Catholic victims of their supposed defenders guilty of? Strangely, Israel/ Hamas has/ had zero to do with it.
@Pork Hunt: The Shankill butchers murder 9 Protestants .
@Soundy Sound: They didn’t rising up . The majority of Catholics were supporting non violent organisations like the civil rights movement and John Humes SDLP . The IRA did not represent the Catholic population of NI . The 26 counties was a 98 percent RC state. It political system was made up of Republican parties . 40 thousand Protestant fled the 26 counties from intimidation and murder during the war of independence. The Protestant population fell to 3 percent. All this is long forgotten. Ireland was not partition in 1921 . The UK was partition . Irish Nats gain 26 counties the UK lost 26 counties. The UK people and unionists just accepted it and move on . Violence has always been the first choice for republican organisations . They always see themselves as the victims in history.
@honey badger: There is literally no point in arguing with someone who’s starting point is claiming that the nationalist population in Northern Ireland were not discriminated against by the ruling system.
@Jack Moss: protected nobody, and in this instance, actively pushed propaganda that could have caused serious damage to a fragile peace process.
Actual state-sponsored terrorism from so called “security forces”
@Alan Roddy: The security forces had a 99 percent arresting rate . Over 25000 republicans were arrested and prosecuted for terrorism and criminality . Less then 200 were killed by the security forces over 25 yrs of the troubles . 3500 people were killed almost half of those were the security forces . In 69 NI was facing an all out civil war . The only thing that stop it going over the edge was the security forces . Over a 100 thousand people died in the three yr civil war in Bosnia . 3500 died in 26 yrs in NI . If it wasn’t for the security forces and emergency services nurses , doctors , paramedics, fire fighters that all stood in the face of terrorism the IRA would have succeeded in murdering tens of thousands more .
@Soundy Sound: What you mean to say is you can’t comfortably justify why the Provos murdered more Catholics than the British Army. The only place you heard there was no discrimination was in your own head. It’s an odd thing to throw out there. Discrimination was so bad that the provos had to kill more of their own people than the British Army.
RUC might’ve changed their name, but didn’t change their anti-Irish senior personnel.
@Uí Braonáin: If I remember rightly if you got a train from Dublin to Belfast the train was often stop before crossing the border on the recommendation from the RUC north of the border . People were put onto buses for their own safety to travel the rest of the journey because the IRA was constantly blowing up the rail line . They blew it 26 times in six months . Trains carrying people from the south came within minutes of being derailed .
British spy planes hover over Gaza daily passing information to Israel on which tent full of innocent defenceless women and children to blow up next
@Kevin O Brien: Are these the same spy planes that are collecting evidence of war crimes etc?
@Kevin O Brien: Ah! Come on now Kevin!!
@Gary Kearney: Same accuracy
Any article on the cop saying no iPas are unvetted , which he clarifies as fingerprinted as identified. Kids in transition year get more vetting for work experience. No comment from the cop on forced deportation , it’s just part of the process. What a joke.
It was a common tactic of the IRA to leave secondary devices to kill the people that attempted to help the injured . The Claudy bombings consisted of three car bombs left on a public street. Car bomb two and three were timed to go off a few minutes after the first bomb detonated . There purpose was to kill the people that ran out onto the street to help the injured of the first bomb . 9 died 6 of them Catholic .
@Jack Moss: Why do you keep bringing religion into it.
@Daniel Roche: People are living in some fairytale land that the IRA were defenders of Catholics which is untrue.
@Jack Moss:
SF RA did not give a dam about the Irish. It was all about a one Island communist sithole state.
Pikes in the Thatch.
@Róisín Guffpuffin:
Pub in Rathkeel??
have your say