Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I am going to continue in English in view of the fact that I addressed this question to the senior Minister. The answer is in the words "senior" and "junior". Irish is not a junior issue; it is a senior issue. The Minister of State mentioned there are many wonderful things happening in respect of the Irish language throughout the country and I agree with him. However, the critical indicator of success is the number of people who stated on their census forms that they speak the language in the Gaeltacht and outside of the Gaeltacht. According to the figures, that number is crumbling.

I spoke to an Irish language education expert. She told me that there are 800 children in the primary education sector who come from Irish-speaking families in the whole of the Gaeltacht. That shows the thread on which language as a community language exists. Unless we have the Irish language spoken as a community language, it loses all its richness and it is not a daily experience.

The Minister of State mentioned Gaelscoileanna. Some 25% of the parents of this country want Gaelscoil education for their children yet just 5% currently receive it. Within the Department of Education and Skills there is no mechanism for an English language school to flip to become an Irish language school. If it is a Catholic school, the Department would help it become a secular school, which is fine, but there is no mechanism within the Department to allow an English language school to become a Gaelscoil, despite the fact 20% of parents are being refused the type of education they would select for their children.

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