Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit. Is éard atá á lorg ag Sinn Féin sa Bhille seo ná go mbeadh na cearta céanna ag Gaeilgeoirí in Éirinn is atá acu san Aontas Eorpach, na cearta atá ag daoine a labhraíonn an Fhraincis i gCeanada, a labhraíonn an Bhreatnais sa Bhreatain Bheag agus a labhraíonn an Bhascais agus an Chatalóinis ina dtíortha féin.

When I heard Senator Maria Byrne talking about the European Parliament, it reminded me that when I stayed in Brussels bilingualism was normal at every level there. When one goes into a shop, one finds products which are labelled in French, in German and in Flemish, even though German is only spoken by 1% of the population. One can avail of state services in any language. Newly arrived immigrants receive free lessons in the languages of their region from the local council. At EU level, Irish is treated with far more respect than it is here. From January next year, Irish will have full official status, the same as English, French and all of the other 22 other languages, meaning that when copies of proposed EU laws are deposited here in the Oireachtas Library from January, they can be read in Irish. The Bills coming before this House will only be available in English and my Irish-speaking colleagues here and in the Dáil will be restricted in their ability to make amendments or propose their own Bills in their national language, despite it being the first official language of the State in the Constitution. Securing full official status in Brussels was not easy. The biggest opponent for many years was the Irish Government, which requested reduced status for Irish when we entered the EU because it pursued a policy of English first. It took decades of campaigning and even a language strike by my colleague Liadh Ní Riada to secure the rights to which Irish speakers are entitled. Tá sé in am don Rialtas anseo an meas céanna a thaispeáint don Ghaeilge agus a thaispeánann an tAontas Eorpach.

It is high time also that we finally respect the Irish language placenames, logainmneacha na nGael, that the British Empire tried to systematically eradicate from our country and which the Irish State continues to leave in áit na leathphingine. Despite promises from the then Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Varadkar, Irish placenames remain subordinate to English on road signs and despite the hard work of Sinn Féin Deputies Ó Snodaigh and Daly to make the case for change in the Dáil, this Bill makes no effort to right this wrong. The Ordnance Survey undertook a colonial mission between 1824 and 1846 to replace our indigenous placenames with meaningless nonsensical bastardised equivalents. This deliberate effort, as described in Brian Friel’s Translations, attempted to break the link between local communities and their surroundings, forcing new generations to unlearn the inherited wisdom that was integral to their meanings and that hold the key to both culture and geography going back millennia.

The Thirty-Two Words for Field, as described in Manchán Magan’s recent book, have been "rendered into garbled and discordant forms". We have seen the disasters of developments being flooded after being built on flood plains that would have been understood from their placenames as Gaeilge. This takes on new significance as we aim to repair our relationship with the environment. The living-language-land project at COP26 has highlighted the way in which indigenous languages tie a culture to their land and has emphasised the co-dependency between environment and communities that must form the basis of the just transition we need to save our planet. Just as we must replant the forests that imperial forces destroyed in their quest to control this island, as described in the old song "Caoine Cill Chais", we must also restore our Gaelic placenames to their rightful status as markers of our place within the ecosystem and reminders of the sustainability that was built into Gaelic life before colonisation. Former colonies across the world have decolonised their placenames upon independence, and the first Uachtarán of this State, Dubhglas de hÍde, called on us to do the same which is why I hope my colleagues here will support Sinn Féin’s amendments to do just that.