Minister envisages 250,000 Irish speakers

Minister envisages quarter of a million Irish speakers


Anton McNulty

AN Ireland with 250,000 daily Irish speakers is the vision of the Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Éamon Ó Cuív, who also envisages a network of Gaeltachtí in towns and cities across the country.
Minister Ó Cuiv made his comments at the official launch of Gnó Mhaigh Eo, where he pledged €165,000 to the company at the Mill Times Hotel in Westport last week. Gnó Mhaigh Eo is a company based in Westport, which offers support and translation services for businesses that are interested in using the Irish language in their business.
As part of his Department’s 20-year plan for the Irish language, Minister Ó Cuív said he hoped that 250,000 Irish people would be speaking the language on a daily basis. Figures from the 2006 census revealed that 90,000 people currently speak Irish on a daily basis.
Minister Ó Cuiv said the problem with teaching Irish in schools was that children could not use it outside school and he felt if young people saw it used in everyday life, they would have an interest in it outside school. He said the gap between having knowledge of the language and speaking it had to reduce and that a change in attitude would have to come from the towns and cities.
“I often say that the Gaeltacht cannot survive without Irish being in the rest of the country, and we have to discuss the idea of the use of Irish outside the Gaeltacht areas. Very often, it is spoken more in the Gaelscoileanna and the Gael Coláistí and I am strongly of the opinion that we should use these schools to build an Irish-speaking community around them and give them official status. You would call them Irish language networks, as they would not be like the traditional Gaeltacht. However, they would be a strong community who would speak Irish to each other every day and get the support of the State. If the Irish language is to grow, statistics show it will have to come from the towns and cities. Because people don’t know each other in the cities like in the country, if there is to be a Gaeltacht in the city, it would need to be a network to fit the type of lifestyle in the cities,” he said.
Minister Ó Cuív said he was happy to give €165,000 to Gnó Mhaigh Eo because their work was normalising the Irish language in everyday life and taking the language out of the backroom and putting it out before the public. He said that as an official European language, having Irish opened up a number of opportunities for people and had come a long way from the attitude of Daniel O’Connell who felt the language was only for the poor.
Mairéad Ní Mhaolchiaráin, CEO of Gnó Mhaigh Eo, thanked the Minister for his donation and announced that they would be investing €1 million into the company over the next three years. She said the Irish language was worth €5.8 million to Mayo’s economy every year and said that using the language in business gave a company an extra advantage.
“When a company uses the Irish language they have a unique advantage over their competitors. They stand out and when people see it, they stop and pay attention to it. They know the company has a connection with Ireland. Companies like Samsung and Vodafone use Irish to attract new customers and they understand that there are people who are looking for a service in Irish,” she said.