Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister's arguments are totally flawed. When the 2006 Act was passed it was not foreseen that NUIG would ever take the extraordinary decision not to require the president of the college to be able to do business in both of our official languages. That is why it was not included in the Act.

We delegate certain powers to authorities but we in this House have never delegated powers in such a way that, if we believe they have been misused, we cannot overrule them. I have been a strong proponent of not handing all power away to non-elected people. What is the point of having an Oireachtas or Dáil Éireann if the people cannot affect policy, if ultimately the people are not sovereign and non-elected groups can do what they want without question from us?

The Minister said being able to speak Irish is not necessary and that a policy can be promoted without it but languages are about communication and I believe that English speakers who do not speak Irish, and have no experience of being able to speak in two languages with full facility, do not fully understand this. Languages are about doing business but let us suppose that somebody was appointed to NUIG Galway who did not have English - it would be farcical. They could have the best policies in the world but they would not be able to communicate with the constituency in its own language.

Irish is an everyday part of Galway and in recent years the city council and mayors have made brave efforts to ensure that Irish is part of everyday discourse. When dealing with the public, the president of NUIG has, up until now, always been able to communicate in whichever of the two official languages was appropriate on a given occasion. Whether it was internal or external, this was no problem because the Act states that the president must have English as well. That may sound trite but it highlights that, to do the job properly, Irish is a necessary qualification as much as high academic achievements are. Irish is a day-to-day requirement, both within the university and with the general public, in order to do the job properly. It is not some ornament but this does not seem to be fully realised by the opponents of this Bill.

In practice, if there have been controversies - and there have been some, such as relating to appointments, promotions and gender discrimination - the president would have been able to defend the college's position or announce changes in the media, on TG4 or Raidió na Gaeltachta as well as in the English-language media but the Minister is proposing that we Irish speakers will have to go to other media if we want to hear what the president of the college is saying. This is in a city which is partly in the Gaeltacht, is on the edge of the largest Gaeltacht in the country and is where the Irish language is part of everyday business. He is saying all the Irish-language sections of the university will have to switch to English when the president of the college is there. In my experience, when one English speaker enters the company everybody turns to English because all of us have a facility in English, whereas I know no Irish speaker with a third level education who cannot also speak English.

Similarly, on all public occasions such as public addresses and lectures and conferrals, it has been traditional for the president to speak in Irish and English. By the Minister's move, the Irish language is something for a policy but it is not something that really counts, such as when one speaks it. It is time those of us who speak Irish every day of every week recognise that what makes a language a language is not academic books or Government policies but is, instead, people speaking it.

What the Minister is basically suggesting is that we open ourselves to the future possibility that the university president will not be able to function fully as a president for all of the college and all of the people in the college in the way he or she should be able to in an official language of the college, of the State and of the city, at the edge of the largest Gaeltacht in the country.

I do not buy the argument that there is any danger in the world we cannot get one competent person to be president of the college who happens to be bilingual. There is no absolute measure of who is the best person for every job. Interview boards have to make a call on these issues. I am sure across many disciplines, and one would be surprised where they are across the globe, there are plenty of competent people who happen to know both official languages of the State. Therefore, I do not accept the idea the university would not be able to get anybody competent. I will put it this way. Supposing the statute had been left the way it was and supposing the job was advertised and the university was honestly able to come back and state it could not get anybody it would have been an interesting situation. As it happens, this situation clearly has not arisen because the person appointed as president not only has Irish ach go bhfuil sé aige ón gcliabhán. He has it from the cradle. He is top quality and significantly qualified in business. He has operated abroad and in a university in Dublin. In fact, the fear expressed completely collapses.

What I think was behind it, and I will say it on the floor of the House, is people wanted to apply for and get this job but they did not have Irish. They wanted it opened up for themselves. I am sorry, but if they were that interested they could have learned Irish. We are not speaking about imposing something huge, we are talking about working Irish and an academic qualification. We are talking about people who claim to be the best academics we could imagine. They say where there is a will there is a way. There was a year lead-in and if the calibre of people the Minister says he wants for the university were interested they could have made sure they had the necessary qualification in Irish in a year. Many people have gone abroad and achieved the equivalent in other countries in the same length of time. The Minister is calling this one wrong. He is doing a much greater disservice than he understands. I ask him to think between now and the vote next week, but I will press this Bill to the end on behalf of my party.

I thank Sinn Féin for its support.

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