John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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Question 391: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the amount which has been spent by his Department in bringing into effect the provisions of the Official Languages Act 2003. [30530/05]

Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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Providing quality customer service in Irish has always been a high priority in my Department. This includes provision of staff training in spoken and written Irish, translation of forms, leaflets and other documents, advertising, and the provision of bilingual signage in public areas. Expenditure on Irish is, therefore, part of the delivery of customer service and it is not possible to state what amount of the total expenditure on Irish results from the implementation of the Official Languages Act 2003. In my Department, specialised staff training has been provided since 2001 while the translation of forms, leaflets and documents into Irish has been in train for many years.

The following is the spend on the various aspects of Irish service provision in 2003, 2004 and 2005 to date:

While the spend to date in 2005 on Irish training courses is low, it is estimated hat the total spend for the year on courses will amount to approximately €85,000.

An element of staff costs arises each year when translation is carried out by staff proficient in Irish. In the case of bilingual signage and advertising, it is not possible to separate the Irish element from the total cost incurred.