James Bannon (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Question 6: To ask the Minister for Community; Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs if he has satisfied himself with the overall effectiveness of the deontas, scéim labhairt na Gaeilge; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28729/10]

Pat Carey (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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Scéim labhairt na Gaeilge was first introduced in 1935 when an annual grant was available to each school-going child for the purpose of encouraging households in the Gaeltacht to use Irish as their everyday language.

The scheme in its current form is in operation since 1993. While it is a mechanism for supporting and promoting Irish as a living household and community language in the Gaeltacht, it can also be seen as representing Government support for the Gaeltacht at a time when the language is facing a major threat due to a number of different factors which have been identified in the linguistic study on the use of Irish in the Gaeltacht. The scheme also provides data on the strength of the language in the various Gaeltacht regions.

A review of the scheme was carried out in 2003-04 and some basic changes to make it more relevant to today's needs were recommended. However, because of the cost involved, these were not proceeded with at the time.

As I indicated, the draft 20 year strategy for Irish envisages significant changes to the definition of the Gaeltacht and the need for significant emphasis in the future on language planning and socio-linguistic interventions. I anticipate that the effectiveness of scéim labhairt na Gaeilge and other Gaeltacht and Irish language schemes will fall to be considered in that context at the appropriate time.

Dinny McGinley (Donegal South West, Fine Gael)
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As the Minister stated, scéim labhairt na Gaeilge has been operational in the Gaeltacht since 1935. For 75 years it has been part and parcel of the educational system in the Gaeltacht where it is administered through schools. Does the Minister agree that the format of the scheme has outlived its usefulness and probably does not accurately reflect the standard of Irish in the Gaeltacht or the extent to which it is spoken in the Gaeltacht? Does he also agree that unfortunately many schools in the Gaeltacht do not submit applications under the scheme? This has implications for the language. Will he outline what were the recommendations of the review group? Is an estimate available as to how much it would cost the Exchequer to implement the recommendations?

Pat Carey (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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The main recommendations were that the scheme would be applicable to new households from the time the first child is born - the main criticism of the scheme is that it only comes into operation when the first child in the family starts attending school, which is too late in terms of language acquisition; support services for learning or improving the Irish language would be available to households; an agreement or understanding would be made between the Department and household regarding the promotion of the language; and the grant would be increased.

I tend to concur with Deputy McGinley. The environment for supporting the Irish language has changed. Having met representatives of parents with young children from inside and outside the Gaeltacht who are anxious to raise their families through the medium of Irish, I consider that it should be possible to support families when children are at an early age. The problem with some of the schemes in place is that they kick in too late. By the time a child is four or five years old and of school-going age, he or she will have missed critical opportunities to acquire language skills. There is considerable merit in working with pre-school children at Naoínraí and their parents to conserve and promote the Irish language.

As some Deputies will know better than I do, a number of initiatives are under way, for example, in Indreabhán and elsewhere in Connemara and in the west Kerry Gaeltacht, to deliver significant inter-agency support to families. This includes support from the Health Service Executive, an agency that is not often spoken about positively, which is providing speech and language therapy services as Gaeilge in a family resource centre. We should examine other ways of supporting the language, although I do not exclude supports that are currently available.

Dinny McGinley (Donegal South West, Fine Gael)
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Does the Minister agree that the main benefit of the scéim labhairt na Gaeilge was to support native Irish speakers, not in learning at school but through language in the home?

Pat Carey (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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Yes.

Dinny McGinley (Donegal South West, Fine Gael)
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Does he also agree that no language can survive as a living language without native speakers? Latin survives as a dead language because there are no native speakers. We do not want Irish to suffer the same fate as Latin. The main benefit of the scheme was in this area.

Pat Carey (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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While I wholeheartedly agree with the Deputy, we need to support those who have chosen to live in the Gaeltacht. Increasingly, both parents will not be native Irish speakers or speak Irish as their first language, if it all. We need to support this group of people. I visited a two teacher school in west Kerry recently and if what I observed there could be replicated elsewhere, the language would be in a great state.

Brian O'Shea (Waterford, Labour)
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If I understood correctly, the Minister believes scéim labhairt na Gaeilge could be extended to families from the Gaeltacht who are living outside the Gaeltacht and families outside the Gaeltacht who genuinely raise their children through the medium of Irish.

Brian O'Shea (Waterford, Labour)
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Do I understand that families who originate in the Gaeltacht and are living outside the Gaeltacht or families who genuinely bring their children up through the medium of Irish outside the Gaeltacht could be considered in the context of scéim labhairt na Gaeilge? A number of times tonight the Minister mentioned the change in the definition of a Gaeltacht. I take it that is moving towards the boundaries of the Gaeltacht also changing. Where that might happen, there could be some families who genuinely bring up their children through Irish but are in a minority. Would it be fair with the new definition of the Gaeltacht and changed boundaries to exclude them from the scheme?

Pat Carey (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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I have not even addressed the issue of boundary changes yet. The Deputy knows what the strategy states and reports have been written in that regard. There are two groups. We need to support and conserve Irish in the Gaeltacht areas. However, there is an emerging group, maybe around the scoileanna lán-Ghaeilge, who are increasingly using Irish as their first language, but very often they need support. I would envisage that in the context of implementing the 20-year strategy, measures would be made available to those new groups as well as groups within the Gaeltacht through a form of the scéim labhartha. I believe it will take different forms. When the pleananna Ghaeilge are formalised - there are a number of interesting ones in different parts of the country emerging already and are almost ready to roll and it is a pity we have not been able to get discussion on this under way more quickly, but we are where we are - and put into effect, different interventions will emerge. Organisations like Foras na Gaeilge and others will form part of support services that will be - and should be - available to families. Some of us present are teachers or former teachers. By starting early we are likely to have a greater impact in whatever language it is.

In the school I mentioned, there was a ten year old girl of Swiss origin. She had been in the school for only a short time and because of the approach taken to the teaching of Irish in that school, she certainly had better Irish than I have.