Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Minister can understand why there is concern around this. I am somebody who has seen the Irish language from both sides. I learned it in an English-speaking school and I think one of the greatest policy failures of the past 100 years is the standard of Irish an average Irish child has. I then went to a Gaelscoil for a year, immersed myself in the language and have been able to speak it relatively fluently since then. The methodology of how we teach Irish has to be scrutinised. I know there have been improvements. There is also a question mark over the number of students who are getting exemptions from Irish but continuing to study other languages, such as French, German or whatever. There is a concern among the Irish language community that there is a soft option to get out of Irish and it is giving the impression that Irish is much more difficult a subject to learn, enjoy or be empowered by than any other, if the Minister understands my meaning.

I want to get my head around it. Does the Minister accept that there is a problem, and what kind of response is the Department intending to make?

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