And finally ...
... here it is.
We've wondered, we've made informed guesses.
You've already spelled out your views on the need to impose duties on any part of the private sector with regard to the Welsh language.
Now the LCO, 6 pages long - 3 in Welsh, 3 in English - is sitting on my desk. We're as certain as we can be it's the real thing so on your marks, get set ...
First this:
(1) Part 1 of Schedule 5 to the 2006 Act is amended in accordance with this article. (2) In field 20 (Welsh language), insert -
"Matter 20.1
Promoting or facilitating the use of the Welsh language; and the treatment of the Welsh and English languages on the basis of equality.
("On the basis of equality" - does that mean "equally" or does it point to wriggle room?)
This matter does not include the use of the Welsh language in courts.
This matter does not include imposing duties on persons other than the following -
"The following" are along the lines we predicted: public authorities, those with contracts to provide services to public authorities, companies who receive public money amounting to £200,000 (any public money whatsoever by the looks of it) or more in a financial year; social landlords, regulators, companies who supply gas, water or electricity services, postal services and post offices, railway services, telecommunication services, ... far too many for some, far foo few for others. No supermarkets. No chippies. Oh but sewerage services are there and worth noting that "telecommunication services" doesn't include broadcasting, radio or television.
Let's move on:
Matter 20.2
Provision about or in connection with the freedom of persons wishing to use the Welsh language to do so with one another (including any limitations upon it".
Recognise the Thomas Cook clause?
Now word about a Commissioner but then "Matter 20.1" clearly devolves the power to create that powerful role.
No mention of sanctions, other than the final words, which we've already dubbed the "get-out clause" for Whitehall departments: "... any functions so conferred or imposed may not be enforced against Ministers of the Crown by means of criminal offences".
Does that mean the Chief Executive of, let's say, Vodaphone or Orange could face a fine if the company doesn't comply but a Minister of the Crown would be treated differently? Do they have what looks like a de facto opt-out?
Just bear in mind that this is an LCO. It is a request for power - what reads as wide-ranging, lock, stock and barrel power - over the Welsh language. It is not yet about future measures, not about which duties the Assembly Government is intending to impose on any part of the private sector. That comes later. The battles over phrases like "where reasonably practicable" (see the 1993 Welsh Language Act) come later.
What the Assembly Government want you to ask at this point is this: who should have the competence, the power to legislate over matters affecting the Welsh language? Us or the UK government?
Six pages of detail says you'll have some trouble with that.
Now ... go.
I'm Betsan Powys, BBC Wales' political editor. I'll be blogging the inside track on 
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~15~RS~)
Comments
Sign in or register to comment.
Us or the UK government?
Would that be the "WAGocracy us"
or
"us the electorate"
No prizes for the answer.
Complain about this comment
Poor. **** poor. Plaid - get out of coalition with Labour.
Complain about this comment
Well nothing controversial to fair minded people in this LCO - after all it just gives the power to the National Assembly that is found with entities like the German Cultural Council of Belgium. Actually because it doesn't devolve all powers over the language just some areas it doesn't even go as far as that.
Of course the real arguments will come when any laws are proposed. Stand by for the usual suspects to raise howls of protest.
Complain about this comment
What's a social landlord? A Housing Association?
Complain about this comment
Well we know what Lyn thinks,
Wonder what the Welsh people think.
But of course that's not important is it.
Must keep the project on the road.
Me I'm moving my office to Bristol.
Complain about this comment
Dewi_H
A social landlord is a "Housing Association", all the carpenter from Newport will need is the Plaid radical, and there are many in that city.
More for unemployment benefits no doubt.
Complain about this comment
Now I pride myself that on a good day I can possibly reach almost average intelligence, but this LCO malarky leaves me cold. I just cannot understand what the hell they are all jabbering about. Betsan is reduced to being some kind of unpaid translator.
Why on earth can't we ordinary people be given the details in plain simple English. Must WAGSPEAK / local government type gibberish always prevail when such (allegedly) important announcements are made?
Anyway, here we are, in the worst state anyone can remember. Unemployment forcast to reach at least 3.5 MILLION, our infrastructure falling apart, crime now at frightening rates, and the Pound worth just a few pennies more than the Euro.
Our debt is now measured in TRILLIONS, a word so strange to us that most have no idea how much it means. . . I looked it up and ONE TRILLION POUNDS is ONE THOUSAND, BILLION POUNDS, or £1,000,000 X £1,000,000, which is the equivalent of giving EVERY household in Wales well over £1 MILLION.
£1,000,000,000,000. . . .that's just 1 trillion, our debt amounts to several.
We really are in the mother of all recessions shortly to become a depression.So what do our obviously insane political leaders (both at Westminster and Cardiff) see fit to waste their time and our money on. . . . . . . . . . . ??????
"Which shop / business /contractor etc., can they force to use Welsh, and which they can't".
For goodness sake Wales, wake up to this insanty. The clowns down Cardiff Bay are dancing to the tune of the Plaid Cymru lunatic element. Like rabbits caught in headlights they stand still. Doing only what their opportunist 'keepers in power'
Plaid Cymru tell them to do.
Unless they want total humiliation at the next elections, they must sever their connection with the Plaid fanatics.
To maintain it will be Welsh Labour political suicide.
Oh yes, and get rid of Plaid's pet rabbit, the turncoat Rhodri (formerly RODNEY) Morgan.
A disgrace to Wales, and Welsh politics.
Complain about this comment
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Would it be Commissioner or Commissar, and would Meri Huws,Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Wales, Bangor, Labour Party member and Chair of the Welsh Language Board, be assisting with the selection process ?
Might you be sub-letting that office in Bristol West-Wales ?
Complain about this comment
"Who should have the competence, the power to legislate over matters affecting the Welsh language?"
At the moment competence lies with a Scottish PM (although he prefers 'British' and pretends he never was a Scot), a Cabinet with one non-Welsh speaking member in it, a House of Commons consisting of 646 members, only a handful of whom can speak Welsh (a mere 40 represent Wales), an unelected House of Lords to which Plaid's nominees have been denied membership, and a non-Welsh speaking Secretary of State. All decisions about our Language are taken in London.
That is what being part of the UK has done for Wales. That is where centuries of being under successive Tory, Liberal, Labour and New Labour governments have got us. What self-respecting people would put up with that state of affairs?
Personally I think the 'lack of breadth' of the LCO is amazing. We have no right to use our own Language in the 'English' courts in Wales, for that's what they are. Where's the justice in that? It puts people whose first language is Welsh at a severe disadvantage when on trial or giving evidence. Why should we have to depend on translation facilities, as if we were not natives of this land we live in? These powers are not even considered for a democratically elected Welsh legislature. Anyone who has ever had any dealings with either the magistrates courts or crown courts in Wales knows just how English dominates everything in them.
The UK government intends to devolve criminal justice to the NI Assembly. What an issult to us, that we aren't considered competent to handle it.
In fact the whole thing is monstrous.
The All Wales Convention is a farce too. We all know that whatever it comes up with or recommends, there isn't going to be a referendum.
As someone commented above, what on earth are Plaid doing soiling their hands in this coalition of unequals? We need an independent voice to speak for the people of Wales who are going to be suffering enormously over the coming years because of the errors of Brown and Blair, and a Labour party that is only concerned with keeping its grip on power at any cost, and which treats Wales with contempt.
Plaid, you're wasting your time.
Complain about this comment
I really can not see how the economic climate effects this proposal in any way. The only people who are expected to provide Welsh language services are large businesses receiving over £200,000 from government or those providing a key utility.
The level of service that these companies will be forced to provide will depend completely on measures passed in votes in the national assembly.
Personally I think this could have gone further but some of the comments here are ridiculous.
Complain about this comment
Telecommunications is a big area. Would this would mean that anyone offering Directory Enquiries, a broadband service, a phone service etc must offer that service in Welsh ?
How are they to do that if their offices and call centres are not in Wales ? Can we really expect them all to setup small offices in Wales just for the handful of customers who want to speak Welsh ?
Lets be real, the Welsh language cannot sustain commercially a daily paper, a TV station or anything without huge chunk of money from the WAG.
Commercially this can't work and this would be a non starter for many many companies
Complain about this comment
message 11......
"I really cannot see how the economic climate affects this proposal....."
Please be so good as to inform me, and I suspect the rest who think adversely re this LCO, just how much in cold cash terms do you think it is likely to cost for a public utility, or major company, to issue bilingual documentation.
Keep one thing in mind, it is not going to be the odd billing issue, as it is at present with the Gas and Electricity, it is the whole range of documention that every large enterprise will be expected to have, in two languages.
How long will it be thereafter, having got this into law, before ALL enterprises, including that chippie in Chepstow, will be required to conform.
The whole thing is a nightmare waiting to happen, besides the actual matter of cost.
The archiving of it all will also be another horrendous doubling of costs.
Considering that only a declared 10 to 20% could actually read that dual language paperwork, if they in fact really want to, and even then, they can ALL read it in English anyway.
The vast majority of such duality will never be read, whether it is English or not.
It will go straight to archive, for legal and fiscal reasons.
So, please, do as I ask, and tell me what your estimate of cost will be?
Complain about this comment
#12 Huxleypiguk wrote:
"Commercially this can't work..."
The issue is not about what can or can't work, but about who makes the decisions about what can or can't work.
Whoever makes them has to live with the consequences. We've had to live for a very long time with the consequences of decisions taken by others. The result has been poverty, with high unemployment, poor infrastructure, lack of investment, exploitation of resources, uncontrolled immigration, a benefit culture, high rates of teenage pregnancy/single-parent families, a second class health service and a massive decline in our native language.
If decisions are taken by the democratically elected representatives of the people of Wales, who can argue with the outcome? The result will be what the people of Wales want for their country, and what they can afford to pay for. It happens in every other nation state.
A few people here have swallowed the propaganda that has flowed for centuries from across the border that we are such an incompetent people that we are incapable of running our own affairs, and what's more, can't afford to do it without other people's handouts. It isn't true. Its patronising and condescending and more to the point insidious and deceitful. Do you think the 'English' are so generous or charitable they want to pay for us to have a good living? It has served England well to have a dependent Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Why did they bother to conquer their neighbours if there wasn't an advantage for them in so doing? They certainly didn't do so in order to lavish their largesse on us.
I won't bore you with a long list of countries which succeed all too well, with fewer resources than Wales has at its disposal.
Complain about this comment
Huxleypiguk is absolutely right in his observations. Telecommunication services is a huge area of commerce, how long before Orange, for example, decides it's share of the Welsh mobile market is insufficient to support a demand for Welsh.
What might happen if "Scottish and Southern", my dual fuel suppliers, decide the costs of providing a Welsh language service is greater than the benefits to its profitability, might I loose my supplier.
How long before the real power behind the throne says enough is enough, we have shareholders to think about.
Might this be the end of the Labour - Plaid coalition?
Complain about this comment
13.
Firstly the LCO does not cost anyone anything other than the time and effort of civil servants. All that is happening is that the right to legislate on utilities and companies taking large amounts of funding from government will be moved from Westminster to Cardiff.
Whether any new legislation is created will depend on the National Assembly which is a democratically elected body.
We do not know what legislation would be proposed by the Assembly but it is fair to say that the cost of translating the billing and services for a large utility firm is pretty minimal (£10,000s for companies making £100m's).
The argument that all Welsh speakers speak English completely misses the point. Using your prefered language allows an individual to communicate much more clearly. And supporting that language allows a seperate culture to survive and flourish. The idea that Welsh should be a language strictly for chapel, the home and eisteddfods is insulting.
Complain about this comment
message 14....
In your second main paragraph you ask about the current situation.
What on earth leads you to think things will change with a separation of this region from the rest of the UK.
Wales of today is the result of the way the western lifestyle has developed over the last century, not pleasant reading for one moment, but wishful thinking will not make it go away.
What may, would be a totalitarian regime, which I am dead certain you would not want, so be very careful what you wish for, you may get it... as goes the current wisdom.
Other small States are all milk and honey are they?
There's none of the downside that YOU see Wales suffering from, is there?
You talk idealism... big scale.
I think you need a large dose of realism in your life.
Complain about this comment
Message 16....
The point has again been missed, it's not what the LCO, as is, proposes, it's what will come next.
I have made a serious effort to try to discover the approximate costs to a largish firm employing about five hundred.,
The accounts manager there told me, that if this proposal become mandatory, the costs to his firm would be an average of £38 per employee per annum. Times 500, ...that IS expensive.
Take that across the whole of the Welsh industrial base and you are looking at mega bucks.
The ongoing costs of archiving and translating would depend on the actual amount of documentation generated, but at a absolute minimum, he saw it as being in the region of 10 k per annum.
His printing costs would pretty well double, as his firm outsourced their printing requirements.
Plus the need to take on one, maybe even two, Cymraeg translators, and he emphasised they would HAVE to be totally fluent in both business, and legal practice, to ensure total accuracy, for fear of putting in place a slow poison pill in the form of wrong information that could come back to haunt both the firm, and it's directors, at some time in the future.
From what he said, I took it that his company had already been discussing it in depth.
He was NOT enamoured of the idea one little bit.
No, the fact that all can use English does not miss the point, what point IS being missed it there is NO need for any of this rubbish in the first place.
All except for a few obstinates, such as yourself, and some from other lands, can utilise English to a completely satisfactory degree.
The usual crap about culture just had to be slipped into your last few words.
What is there in this culture, you have mentioned the only bits that can readily be claimed as 'culture', and those are not as valid as even you could wish them to be.
Note, ....I did not disparage the language one single time.
So please be circumspect in your manner, and manners, if you decide to respond.
Complain about this comment
Well either Betsan's playing things down, or this so-called moderate is whistling in the dark. . . .
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7863844.stm
All cut and dried according this 'Lord'....
Complain about this comment
I just noticed "post offices" are included in the list.
Now as the majority of post offices are small businesses, and if we believe the press, under severe economic pressures, is it the intention to denude the countryside of this service, unless of course there is a Welsh speaking company waiting in the wings, readying itself to take advantage of an opportunity and take over post offices en-mass.......
........ I shudder to think what our local Mr Akram would say if he gets a letter explaining his obligations, it certainly wouldn't be said in Welsh.
Complain about this comment
I am hugely annoyed by the arrogance shown by Lord Elis-Thomas when he talks about the 'powers being transferred FOR EVER'.
'AM BYTH'. How singularly depressing that somebody else thinks that Westminster powers can be delegated elsewhere, whether to Wales, or the EU, not for one Parliamentary term, but beyond that term and bind successor Governments.
Where is Tony Benn when you need him ?
Westminster borrows the power from us, the electorate, and then hands them back to us at the end of the term until we have decided again who should have the powers.
NO ONE has voted to give powers over the language to the Cardiff Bay bureaucracy and they have absolutely ZERO democratic legitimacy for this hijacking.
I am Welsh born and bred - my first language is Welsh, but there is something even more important to this country and it is the Parliamentary DEMOCRACY which our forefathers fought and died for.
This is a SAD SAD SAD day for the Welsh and for a united family of Welsh people, and now the Taffia will be free to sow the deep division which will be the decay of this once great nation.
STICK IT UP YOUR JUNTA DAFYDD ELIS-THOMAS !!!!!
Complain about this comment
Also, how long will it be for Pembrokeshire restaurants have to provide menus in Italian to cater for the 'minimum wage' contract workers who will be parachuted in to provide labour for Milford Haven when local unionised labour proves too expensive ??
Also how will the 'Caban Y Dderwen' cafe in Carmarthen have a 'unique selling point' when all the other cafes, McDonald's included, have to provide Welsh language menus ??
Complain about this comment
# 18 Mapexx
Here's the standard contradiction for this message:
1. You are characteristically offensive about the language and its culture:
"this rubbish [about language, bilingualism, translation, etc.] ... the usual crap about culture"
2. and then claim:
"I did not disparage the language one single time"
And here's the standard mistake (I'll give two, just for kicks):
1. "the need to take on one, maybe even two, Cymraeg translators"
You say this as if these people would have to be extra staff, when in fact all it would require (if at all) would be for the existing workforce to gain extra skills; and a more skilled workforce is a priori a better thing.
Win-win.
2. "the fact that all can use English does not miss the point"
It misses perhaps the biggest point there is. We could all use Farsi, Latin, Greek or Klingon if we were taught to do so at school, but we wouldn't necessarily choose that as our sole language option in our daily lives. You confuse the issue chronically, as you do in your #13:
3. "Considering that only a declared 10 to 20% could actually read that dual language paperwork..."
The goal is not to remain in this place where 80% of the population are unable to have access to their own language (consequence of Acts of Union, colonisation, Blue Books, Education Acts, centralised misgovernment, economic woes, etc.), but to make the language accessible once again to everybody who wishes it. This is a step in the right direction: the direction of choice.
Complain about this comment
18.
I am going to ignore your final jibe of "what is there in this culture..." as I assume it is a statement deliberately designed to cause offence.
As for your main point I think that your "effort to discover the cost" is pretty poor. If we start by accepting that this company receives over £200,000 per year in government grants that only means that the Assembly has the right to legislate, not that it will. Your assumption that the government is going to force every company it can to provide everything bilingually is ridiculous. The government is elected and is responsible to the voters.
It is right that Welsh speaking workers should be allowed to speak Welsh amongst themselves in the workplace. It is right that you should be able to receive utility bills through the medium of Welsh. Personally I also think there should be pressure on utility companies to provide Welsh language forms, information and services.
This does not mean that a customer or member of staff will be able to go into any department of their company and demand that they receive all of their correspondence in Welsh. This image of every order/payslip and receipt being duplicated is ridiculous and you sound foolish for making such an argument.
Complain about this comment
Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas said ......
"The power to make laws will be transferred to the WAG".
....... and finished with .....
"a hugely significant day"
not for the Union .......
Complain about this comment
20.
By post offices it means either the Royal Mail or any private company that in the future takes over this contract. So yes the government could, if in future a majority in the Assembly wanted it, force the royal mail to provide it's pricing and forms in Welsh. But Mrs Jones in your local post office will never have to provide Welsh language labels on the stationery and sweets that she sells.
No government would ever force small businesses to employ full time translators. This is the kind of scaremongering that causes such misunderstading over the language. Either you are very misinformed or deliberately trying to scare people.
I repeat though that this LCO is only the right to legislate and does not in practice mean any change for anybody in Wales.
Complain about this comment
And off they go again: the Welsh-bashers, bilingualism-haters, divide and rulers, the 'I'm moving my office' brigade, the 'how long before ethnic cleansing' brigade, the 'elitist Welsh-speakers', 'here come the Taffia/Crachach/etc', the paranoid, the sad, the anglo-supremacists, the minority-haters and the Brit-Nat, 'all was so much better under John Redwood' brigade.
Boring, boring , boring.
All I do is go and spend a week working in trilingual Switzerland, where no-one has any problems with roadsigns, translation, trilingualism and multi-lingual daily life, and I come back to this pointless interlinked barrage of repetitive clichés.
If I was asked by a foreigner to say what was wrong with our country I'd point him/her in the direction of Messrs R Sembly, Westy the Wailer, The Stoned Mason, his Lordship 'Welsher than thou' Beddgelert, and the the rest of the embittered cliché-mongers who have so little to do some of them actually post up to 12 times on the same evening.
Boring, boring , boring.
How come you don;t bore yourselves?
Complain about this comment
"I repeat though that this LCO is only the right to legislate and does not in practice mean any change for anybody in Wales. "
This is exactly the sort of disingenuous and misleading nonsense that took us into the 'common market' [so-called.]
If there really was no intention to use these powers, why has there been such a really determined effort to wrest them from the 'Mother Of Parliaments' ??
I hate what this process is doing to us as a nation, setting neighbour against neighbour and provoking people to say horrible things about Welsh speakers like me, whereas in the past people were rubbing along just fine.
Complain about this comment
Wil_CC , are you better informed as to the intentions of the LCO, are you WAGocracy incognito ....
Matter 20.1 above .....
Promoting or facilitating the use of the Welsh language; and the treatment of the Welsh and English languages on the basis of equality...........
This matter does not include imposing duties on persons other than the following -
"The following" are along the lines we predicted: ............ postal services and post offices,
Not my words see above, read carefully, "post offices" .....
...... and not..... "This is the kind of scaremongering that causes such misunderstanding over the language" .....
...... rather an understanding of our politicians, Plaid predominantly.
Complain about this comment
Is the text available online?
Complain about this comment
This is a divisive subject and the people of Wales should have a say!
It concerns me that the Presiding Officer of the Assembly - who is supposed to be neutral - appears to be taking sides in this matter.
Wil_CC at 26 - I think you are being naive.
The Welsh Language Board have a track record in this area.
They have insisted on the same draconian rules enforced on County Councils under the 1997 act have to apply to small Community Councils who have virtually no income and no paid staff and represent wholly English Speaking communities.
These Councils have no option but to employ proffesional translators because there is no on ein the community able to do it.
Attempts to invoke the "Reasonable and Practicable" clause are simply not accepted, and the WLB is Judge, Jury, and Executioner, there is no appeal.
Ellis Thomas has said that the wording of the new act would be essentially the same as the existing 1997 WL Act.
And as Bethan points out failure to meet the requirements of the new Act will be a Criminal Offence.
Your local Post Office has no chance.
Complain about this comment
When I was in school, I was FORCED to eat cabbage, and I have never ever, from that day to this, ever eaten cabbage since.
When I was in school, the only sport I could play in Games during the winter was rugby.
I never ever played rugby after leaving school.
Welsh is a wonderful, glorious language with, despite what some of the snipers say here, a great culture and wonderful history. Up to now we have had a great story to tell in the persuasion of people to learna da lingo - and then be able to read literature and chat to the locals.
But now it will be seen as linguistic boiled green cabbage, forced down the throats of people without being made into a tasty recipe - just force-fed for those lower human drives of commerce and business.
What chance now of recruiting artists and musicians to learn Welsh, when instead of being something to be loved and nurtured, it will be something to loathed as being forced on the unwilling by the uneducated and the consensual adult social intercourse is replaced by rough forced compulsion.
As Swiss Toni might have said, 'Learning the Welsh language is like making love to a beautiful woman...'
Complain about this comment
I must admit to enjoying efforts of all the 'I'm not against the language but...' bloggers on this site, attacking legislation that has not even been clarifed yet passed.
All the old chestnuts are coming out about people being forced out of Wales etc, yet of course this will not happen. Small businesses are not affected with compulsory rules and the larger telecom firms crying foul are the very same working multi-ligually in nations across Europe-with no complaints of costs there.
Many Labour and the Tory MPs will of course try to block all they can in London, but if a piece of legislation has been written in the interests of language equality, one wonders why such enlightened people are so keen to promote inequality?
I'm not at all bothered about the same 'Welsh Nots' who always come out of the woodwork at such times, and am hopeful that the LCO will concentrate more on existing speakers making use of well managed bilingual services resulting from the historical piece of Welsh law.
It's just a shame that we have to use such a ridiculous LCO system to get there.
Complain about this comment
"his Lordship 'Welsher than thou' Beddgelert, and the the rest of the embittered clich?-mongers who have so little to do some of them actually post up to 12 times on the same evening."
Aha - fame at last !! The proponents and supporters are accusing me of being 'Welsher than thou'. I could say 'Physician heal thyself'!
But I'd better not. Indeed, as I passed my Welsh Lang O-level [that dates me !] but failed my Welsh Lit, maybe I will be forced to do the re-sit I avoided all those years ago..
Without wishing to raise the temperature of the debate anymore, I don't think I can plead guilty to being a 'Welsh-bashing..hater' while at the same time being W-t-t. But your point is well made.
I'm simply saying that there is a danger of 'balkanisation' here which I don't see as helpful. Your comparison with Switzerland is well made - but Wales already has the WLA to help in this regard. I'm not really sure that further compulsion is what's required.
You tell us off for posting frequently [fair dos...] but what worries me is that this may be glossed over by the BBC, just like much of the European legislation whose effects and 'unintended consequences' are only now being felt and being exploited to the full by a certain British nationalist political party.
Or indeed like much of the multiple culture legislation on the books which wasn't really scrutinised as it went through and which lead to Trevor Phillips, when he was head of the Commission for Racial Equality to say we were, as a British nation 'Sleepwalking to segregation'.
I don't want all this hatred and vitriol and bile [and yes, I do get a bit ranty myself occasionally and will no doubt get accused of hypocrisy..] because the Welsh have, as far as I can remember, always taken the view that we 'stick together or fall apart'.
And I just worry where we are heading now, as these steps don't appear to have enough backing of 'hearts and minds' and that is just storing up trouble for the future.
If we were all stuck in a pub in the wilds of Wales this cold evening we would nurse our pints, and be chatting, some in English, some in Welsh but all whingeing about the 'powers that be', and discussing the rugby and the weather and generally just getting along.
It takes the political class to come up with a wedge issue that in these troubled times for the economy which may divide us more than we had realised as even people on the same side of the debate over the first Welsh Language Act cannot agree over the best thing for Welsh families and workers.
Let us stop for a cup of tea and sandwich at a wonderfully unregulated greasy spoon cafe, and ponder what we are doing before we risk legislating Welsh-ness businesses out of existence..
Complain about this comment
West-Wales # 31:
1. "existing 1997 WL Act"
there was no 1997 Welsh Language Act. What you've done (not for the first time) is to commit the wonderful Freudian slip of identifying the establishment of the Assembly (1997) with the WLA (1993), demonstrating one of the deep misunderstandings which permeate this 'debate' (i.e. "language" = "assembly" = "nationalist" = "by Jove, despicable behaviour on the part of the natives, what?!").
2. "the same draconian rules enforced on County Councils under the 1997 act have to apply to small Community Councils who have virtually no income and no paid staff and represent wholly English Speaking communities."
Could you specify what community councils are you talking about, and what "draconian rules"? Is there actually any evidence of "wholly English Speaking communities" being forced by the WLB in whatever manner it is you're suggesting?
I've not heard of anything of the kind, and I suspect it's another urban myth.
***
LordBeddGelert # 28: "this process is [...] setting neighbour against neighbour and provoking people to say horrible things about Welsh speakers like me"
Perhaps these ignorant people who are taking it out personally on you should be considered to have some responsibility for their actions, rather than their being simply unthinking, reactionary droids. Hmmm... then again, perhaps you're closer to the truth than I thought!
Complain about this comment
What most people think are post offices aren't they are sub post offices. Post offices aren't those small businesses run by Mrs Jones etc, they are the large offices run by the government agency known as the post office.
Stonemason is once again stoking the flames, suggesting one request from a Plaid member would throw him out of his job and by implication all staff working for a housing association would have to speak Welsh.
Scaremongering of the worst kind, totally untrue and unfounded yet he persists in this.
As for Scottish And Southern, they already provide a Welsh language service to those customers who require it.
For those in North and Central Wales their former monopoly supplier is now owned by a Spanish company that is used to using at least 4 languages in their home country. The cost? a drop in the ocean.
Complain about this comment
Lyn_Thomas,
We don't have a post office run by your "government agency known as the post office".
All the POs in Caerphilly are run by one business or another.
Raising questions is not "stoking the flames", if the WAGocracy had done its job properly such questions would have been anticipated. Personally I believe the questions being raised have been answered, by the various interest groups in tandem with the WAG, shame the answers are not shared.
Who are you Lyn_Thomas, rhetorical question, not very Welsh to deny a democratic question.
Who are you daverodway, rhetorical question, not very democratic to deny the Welsh questions.
Plaid ...............
Complain about this comment
Bestan
Oh,how terribly sad for Wales.
Recognition for the language - brilliant - its equal at long last.
Bad side is increased legislation, bureaucracy, policing, enforcement and subsequent loss of jobs and business closures
- Absolutley the MOST DAFT SHOT IN THE FOOT THE WA could have self-inflicted!
Is there an LCO on the Assembly itself and its members and their staff?
Do many know that during the late 1960's and early 1970's the Labour Education Authorities in South Wales (and other parts) completely BANNED the teaching of Welsh language in many schools.
So many truly Welsh people WERE DENIED THE CHANCE TO LEARN WELSH and are now employed and run businesses successfully contributing to the Welsh economy and the health and welfare of the nation, without any second thought.
Why make so many of these redundant by this clumsy legislation? Who will pay their mortgages, rent, food, energy bills?
Do any of these legislators live or work in the real world, rather than air-conditioned isolation?
Good for the language but EVERYONE in WALES will pay MORE TAXES to pay for the Welsh POLICE to POLICE the Welsh!
Who will be Head of the new WEPA (Welsh Enforcement Policing Agency)?
Makes you weep doesn't it!
Complain about this comment
Is the objective behind this to make Wales Plc more competitive?
Will our GDP, as a percentage comparator of UK Plc, improve?
How will the small business backbone of Wales manage?
It is already difficult for small firms to win Public Sector Tenders, and very expensive to keep entering into Tender exercises with very little prospects of success.
Will this enhance small firm success rate, or create another barrier?
Complain about this comment
39.
I hate to keep repeating myself but this will not effect small businesses. Only companies receiving over £200,000 per year from government could be effected and in all likelyhood only large service providers will be legislated for.
Complain about this comment
At last some sense - Comment 27 - well said daverodway.
Complain about this comment
I have just been watching a programme re the historical differentials in Albania between Serbs and others.
I could just as easiliy have been watching exactly the same about Wales, The same old nonsense, dragging up historical 'facts' by bioth sides to justify the arguments being touted.
There is a large movement inn the south east European area, involving all the states in the region, to reconstruct the history, not to deny it, but to make iut more palatable to all sides so that they can in future refrain from using their ethnic perceptions as a basis for their one sided arguments.
Exactly as is not happening in Wales, with the one sided argument over the Welsh social and economic scene.
The direct opposite in fact is being taken up, to strengthen the argument for divisive practices that will affect the whole population.
My wife works in the NHS, and has discovered that if this LCO gets approved, the NHS will be compelled to take on at least two more staff, who are comletely fluent in legal and commercial aspects of Cymraeg, in orderr to resond to incoming callers on the telephone. Actually in her department they have no public pedestrian access, so it all has to be on the 'phone.
This in the face of no more than about three calles per year for the last ten years or so, in Cymraeg.
These two extras will be there purely for the purpose of translating, there are no requirements for them to do any other work as the manpower roster is already slightly over staffed, and natural wastage is being utilised to reduce the existing staffing level.
The mentioned pay scale for these two extra numeries will be between 20 and 22k per annum.
This will require a loss in other NHS services to that cost level, which could easily be against the bill for patient care.,
40/44K would go a long way if used elsewhere.
The comment that existing staff should take up the reins of this requirement is fatuous, as those employed there would have to be seriously persuaded to starta on learning a language they have no personal need for, and therefore would show, not only a disinclination to learn, but would be virtually impossible to enthuse over.
As for the 80%(?) being persuaded,( by what means?) to take up the language, does it not enter your head that if they wished to become Cymraeg capable, never mind fluent to any degree, they would already be attempting to become so.
The total disinterest shown by the vast majority should be telling you somethjing that you are obviously not seeing.
But by all means carry on forcing the issue,
as with all other forced issues it will untlimately fail in it's endeavours, for the simple reason, as is covered by that old adage....you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink...
Regarding the objective of the LCO in demanding that public bodies comply with the enforced idea they should all do everything in two languages, fair enough if the second one was in massive demand, which it is not anyway, but how long will it be for the demand to reach into the private sector, where there is a large amount of antipathy to such a move?
And further, how long before it became mandatory for ALL business's, no matter what size, would be required to comply.
Your slipped in little bit about the 80% having access to their own language is a total laugh, it is because Cymraeg is NOT their own language that 90% stcik where they are at.
I seriously doubt that whatever means are taken to alter that, they will succeed.
This morning a report was released stating that there is much unhappiness in British kids becausef, in part, of their parent's objectives.
This I have witnessd myself when studying the way in which schoolkids around here revert to English, as they leave their Ysgol Gymraeg, many of whom attend those units because their parents insist on them doing so.
The reasons given range from the sublime to the ridiculous. Mostly the latter.
.
Complain about this comment
Message 27....
I presume that was your last one then?
Not only are you bored with all our ' free speech' points of view, and are emphatically bored, you suffer from the exact same compliant yourself.
Boring? You are worse than a dentist's drill.
No valid argument, just complaint.
Another frustrated Cymro.
Complain about this comment
Introducing the legal right to speak Welsh in Wales, why, why why is our country the only place in the whole world where this is controversial. Can you imagine the politicians in France or Germany or Russia or Botswana aruing against letting their people speak their own native language?
Well done Plaid. The people of Wales need leaders that will stand up for them not just take the crumbs from London's table.
Complain about this comment
Thank you daverodway for that bit of common sense - and sanity.
Re 21
What a sad message. It's the philosophy that the Welsh and the Welsh language shouldn't make a fuss, should just behave, should be seen and not heard, shouldn't be a nuisance. I , for one, am not prepared to be that subservient any more.
I have asked you a question before, which is what parliament anywhere in the world only deals with only one matter at a time, even in grave economic times? So why shouldn't it do this?
Please tell me when it was that the Welsh decided that all matters pertaining to the Welsh language should be settled by Westminster? People's idea of democracy is certainly coloured by their own prejudices.
I'm afraid it's you the British Nationalists who are trying to sow divisions over this matter. Some - as in your case LordBeddgelert - because of timidity, tugging your forelock as you do; and others because of their clear hatred of the language
Complain about this comment
"My wife works in the NHS, and has discovered that if this LCO gets approved, the NHS will be compelled to take on at least two more staff, who are comletely fluent in legal and commercial aspects of Cymraeg, in orderr to resond to incoming callers on the telephone. Actually in her department they have no public pedestrian access, so it all has to be on the 'phone."
Genius to work that out as no Act has been written. Scaremongering of the worst kind.
Complain about this comment
Re 43
mapexx,
You really should be given a comedy award. You are the person most likely to give long tedious entries full of the most ungracious insults and are the most likely to not answer other people's questions ...
That you are so angry - again! - just shows that WAG are doing something right.
Complain about this comment
Message 44.....
When will you people realise that we who oppose this LCO are not stupid.
We are well aware what is behind this move, and it has nothing to do with the Language use, which is NOT in any way banned, or sidelined, in Wales.
No one is stopping anyone using the language if they so wish, but that is not the case, is it?
The whole idea of this LCO is to obtain powers, that once in place will lead on to yet further demands for even more 'powers'
That is why we are against this, and any other move, that uses the language as a means to an end.
The places you mention probably have minority languages, but whether they out- right ban them, or even suppress them, is not mentioned in your message, but to use those major languages to try to emphasise your silly point is baffling me.
German, French, and whatever is used in Botswana, (is it Bantu or Swahili, I don't know) are THE major languages in those countries, whereas Cymraeg is not the MAJOR language in Wales. Nor is it ever likely to be so.
If you wish to try for brownie points by using examples from overseas, at least pick examples that equate to Cymraeg within countries that have minority languages, banned, suppressed, or not.
Your plaudits for Plaid shows your allegiance.
Not to be recommended for intelligent folk, I must say.
Between Plaid, and the promoters of Cymraeg, under the terms currently being expounded, the language is certain to be doomed, for the antipathy it is already stirring up.
Softly, softly catchee monkey.
Those with the loudest voices do not always carry the day.
Complain about this comment
What's the problem?
I'm amazed at the anti-Welsh sentiments on here. Amongst my friends, the non-Welsh speakers tend to be supportive of the language, so I'm not used to hearing such negative comments.
Part of it I suspect is the fact that the dominance of English as a world language means that people in the UK don't think much about issues of translation. It's noticeable that HSBC with their tagline of 'The World's Local Bank/Banc Lleol y Byd' is one of the companies that advertise in Welsh on S4C. They operate in so many languages, another one is not so much of an issue.
I'm the daughter of a non-Welsh speaking Welshman who left Wales to go to University in the 60s and didn't come back until 5 years ago. I always wanted to learn Welsh and it was a major reason why I did Celtic Studies in Aberystwyth and why I now live in Cardiff rather than having stayed in Cambridge where I did my postgrad studies. My parents are also living here now and learning Welsh. It can be done.
Also, one comment that hasn't been made is the advantages that being bilingual gives you. Maybe not all the kids at Welsh medium schools appreciate it while they're there, but they might well do so later in life!
Complain about this comment
I wonder did any of you listen to the Radio Wales call in on this exact subject at lunchtime. The number of calls urging common sense on this issue was incredible!
Well well.... i've heard the term silent majority used a few times on these boards but never was there a clearer indication of it than on that call in. If I were a self serving politico secretly using the language as means of getting more power I would be very worried right about now. The fact that hundreds of people in the WAG and QUANGOs (paid for by the welsh public) have been working or lobbying on this issue in the last few months has clearly been taken as an insult by those Welsh people losing there jobs, fingernails and minds in this recession!!
The direction this onewales government is taking us is completely at odds with what the vast majority out there feel!
Complain about this comment
Thank goodness I no longer live in Wales. 29 years of this kind of thing drove me completely up the wall.......
When I first moved to Wales in 1977 I found the culture and language really interesting and took a real interest even learning Welsh and found it a fascinating language especially realising that this was a really ancient tongue the original language in the British Isles and completely different from any other language I'd studied.
But then it got taken over by the "taffia" and you had to get your child into a Welsh language school or they would never make it in Welsh society. Then came the Assembly and their interminable droning about nothing.
Meanwhile all bills etc came in bilingual versions whether you wanted it or not. There are plenty of Welsh people who don't want their bills in Welsh not just English incomers as I was. But no-one is allowed to say so. As I say thank goodness I'm no longer there. It's all so unimportant in the bigger scheme of things. If Welsh is going to survive it won't be because people in the Assembly think it's a "good thing". It will be because people in Wales want to use it and it will be a much more organic process.
I can see the language did need a helping hand and I can also see a lot of Welsh people (very understandably) felt very antagonistic towards the English who had historically done their best to stamp it out and also to exploit Wlsh people but and here I really am sticking my head above the parapet.......get over it!!!!! Most people in England are exploited too and we're not all to be hated.
Going on and on about the language and laying down even more rules about it's use just turns everyone off completely.
Complain about this comment
FiDafydd..
"Some - as in your case LordBeddgelert - because of timidity, tugging your forelock as you do; and others because of their clear hatred of the language"
Can you not understand that people have a range of different views on this topic ? And that just because not everyone shares your view is no reason to stamp about and have a tantrum like a child who has been told that they are not going to have any more sweeties.
I resent being told I need this LCO 'to be able to speak in Welsh'. Whenever I pick up the phone to my mum, I speak to her in Welsh and have not yet needed to get Government approval to do so.
What is your point here ?
Complain about this comment
It's such a shame that there is not one Welsh language and that everything done in Cardiff is so centred on the south!
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr at 35
My apologies for the typo 97 instead of 93 – rushing.
you ask;
“Could you specify what community councils are you talking about, and what "draconian rules"? Is there actually any evidence of "wholly English Speaking communities" being forced by the WLB in whatever manner it is you're suggesting?”
This information from Wikipedia should help
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milford_Haven
[Issue with Welsh language
In November 2008, the local council demanded the right to opt-out of a scheme in which official documents had to be translated into Welsh if requested. They argued that it was too costly a scheme for an area with few Welsh speakers. Supporters of the scheme to provide bi-lingual versions of signs and official documents argued that it is a positive, not punitive, measure. Milford Haven was allegedly one of about 10 Welsh councils which opposed having to make such translations.In late November 2008, the town council agreed to implement the bilingual scheme.]
The supporter quoted is Meri Huws though a local Plaid Councillor also supported the scheme a loan voice.
Three of the Councils who opposed implementing the scheme were Town Councils the rest were small Community Councils, but they were all told in no uncertain terms that not adopting a Scheme would be a failure to comply with sections 5 & 7 of the Welsh Language Act 1993 which is an offence for which both the Council and individual Councillors can face charges.
You will know that many small Community Councils operate on a shoe string have no paid employee, finding a Clerk is difficult.
Many of these small Councils are the life blood of the Community, organising and supporting events, providing facilities, and acting as an information distribution centre via the Council Notice board.
You can imagine the impact of this simple clause in the WL Scheme;
“Lottery tickets, brochures and displays will be provided in Welsh and English”.
Every thing that goes on the Council notice board must be Bilingual.
Fine except that this is Wholly English speaking community, there is no one who can or is willing to translate free of charge.
All bilingual notices must be professionally translated. cost £70 per 1000 words £30 minimum charge!
So what about Mrs Jones scribbled note “Has anyone seen my cat” –
Or a council note "meeting at church hall tonight" they can no longer go on the Council Board. Unless in both languages.
A newspaper advert current cost say £30 – now its double the size £60 - plus of course the translation fee - £90 !!!
We can go on discussing the implications there are many - like; the local Historical Society trying to put on a display that they have put together themselves. The Council can no longer provide facilities or support, unless they make the display bilingual – do you think they will be able to do that.
One more - in our Community a couple of Lads were setting up a Community Website.
The Council were intending to support it and pay for the maintenance and host ISP.
There is a clause which says; All Websites have to be Bilingual. – the project is dead. There is no way the Community can afford to pay for Translation or Bilingual upkeep.
The 1993 act is bad law – it is destroying communities not strengthening the Language.
It seems the proposed new LCO legal framework is to be the same as the 93 act – Its not going to help.
If you want to strengthen and rebuild the use of the Language there must be better less destructive and divisive methods.
There’s enough money being spent on enforcement divert it to more sensible constructive ways to reinforce the language and culture.
One more thing;
Wil_CC at 40
Reread the proposed LCO, youll find it a lot more encompassing than it you say - consider the WLB track record - stop and have a good think.
I agree it is sensible to think no one in their right mind would enforce some of the things that are in the act - and there is the "Reasonable & Practicable" clause.
It counts for nothing - the WLB are, as I said before, Judge, Jury, and Executioner.
Their objective and vision is what counts.
Complain about this comment
I suggest that the anti-Welsh lot on here log onto Bryan Taylor's blog and ask the Scots if they want their Parliament scrapped.
Also ask them if they'd prefer an assembly on the lines of that in Wales, where their First Minister and Members would have to go cap-in-hand to London to ask for power to legislate for the people of Scotland. You'd be laughed or scorned out of the place.
Only a petty and simple-minded Labour party could devise and create an institution as pathetic as the Welsh Assembly, and the LCO system of the 2006 Act. This is a party which the people of Wales have demonstrated great loyalty to for over a century, and this how we're repaid by them. That Blair and Brown have made the worst mess of any Labour government in the party's history is not surprising. They have landed us in two illegal or immoral wars, and brought the country to the brink of bankruptcy. We will be paying the price of their disastrous policies for decades. I hope they are obliterated at the next election. They deserve nothing less.
The future of the Welsh language should be decided by the people of Wales, in Wales, not by a bunch of foreigners.
Complain about this comment
Good post Janchild.... It used to be that you could only make such a statement after you had left Wales for fear of being called anti-welsh, a little englander or heaven forbid that laughable insult 'english' (why do the nats always assume what offends them will offend others... to me that insult is pathetic and shows their true insecure colours). However, after listening to BBC Wales this lunchtime it appears that it is a long last a free country that we are living in and we are able to say what we think!
it amuses me that the language elitists when with their backs up against the wall always 'the language belongs to al the people of Wales'.... hmm funny then that for all these years we've never been allowed to question the wasteful and oppresive way in which it is funded/promoted.
All of this backlash from people on here never existed historically I dont think. It seems that it is a build up as a result of the politicising of the welsh language. It's hard to say exactly when this started but I would hazard a guess it was sometime during 1999 ;) lol! I would say this politicising reached its peak approximately, and this is a very rough guess now, well sometime around lunchtime on the 27th of June 2007 :)
Complain about this comment
I am thinking of asking the Westminster parliament to make Norman French Englands second language. It fits the bill perfectly, very few speak it, even fewer understand it and it would confuse visiters to England. It's a sad fact that languages do fade away and die and no amount of wishing otherwise will change that fact. I am not saying that Welsh is fading or dieing but it is not the language spoken by the majority of Welsh people. When I visit Wales I like the feeling of diference that Welsh gives the country but to try and force its use to is the quickest way to put non speakers off learning it.
Complain about this comment
West Wales -- in comment 54 you talk about the Milford Haven example.
a) There's a difference between a 'Wholly English speaking community' and one with 'few Welsh speakers'.
b) As I understand it, the point of drawing up a Welsh language scheme is to set out what use of Welsh is to be required in that area. Given that the Vale of Glamorgan council scheme doesn't aim to provide a fully bilingual website, I doubt that a community council would be forced to include such an aim in their Welsh language scheme.
The Bwrdd yr Iaith Guidelines (available on their website [Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]) say:
For its part, when considering schemes submitted to it for approval, the Board will have due regard to the nature, size, location and activities of each organisation, and its relationship with the public in Wales,
to determine in an objective manner which guidelines and advice are applicable, and what types of measures should appropriately be included in the scheme. In doing so, it will be applying the test of what
is “appropriate in the circumstances and reasonably practicable” set out in section 5(2) of the Act.
Complain about this comment
msg #54 west-Wales
You have it wrong, the council only has to provide documentation when it is requested. According to Walesonline, "The last time Welsh language documents were requested from the town council was in 1995." ( http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2008/11/10/milford-haven-wants-out-of-language-law-91466-22217080/ )
So the cost has been minimal for the last 14 years.
Complain about this comment
In simple words:
"Why?"
"What for"?
"How much"?
"Who pays"?
"Who Gains?"
"Who Loses?"
"Would the money and time be better spent elsewhere?"
"Can we afford it in these trying economic times?"
Will someone give me some sensible answers.
Complain about this comment
Message 49.....
I have yet to see any hard evidence that learning Cymraeg advantages one to take up a further language.
Yes, I hace seen a few comments on this and other blogs, but eveidence? in short supply I think.
But that said, if you think learning Cymraeg is advantegeous,( I do not say this to those brought up speaking it) please inform in what way does it supercede French, German, or any other well used globally spread language.
It defies common sense to learn Cymraeg in order to then proceed to other languages.
A waste of time, especially considering the language is virtually useless beyond the eastern border of this region.
Even more useless ,speaking in commercial terms.
Surely the best option would be to go straight to a preferential foreign language. One that can be utilised beyond Wales itself.
To return to my third paragraph... those brought up from birth speaking the language WILL benefit from knowing it, they will be the ones who, being bilingual, (with generally, English) so I have no doubt their foothold in extended language study will be well placed.
Beyond all of that, as I have stated previously, the current crop of Cymraeg promoters are using the language as a political weapon, with which to beat the status quo down.
They use all sorts of rhetoric,refernce to an invisible culture, historical events that have no bearing on today, and any other tool they can manage to discover, that they think will give them and edge in the matter.
Complain about this comment
At No.14 brynt41 states that Wales is a nation state.
Well I've got news for him.
Wales is only a Principality. It has never had national status and probably never will.
Just as Northern Ireland is a Province so Wales is something similar.
The real crunch for these small time nationalists is that we live in a United Kingdom. Our first language is English just as it is for many others around the world. Let those who wish to learn and speak Welsh do so but please do not act as control freaks over everyone else.
The fact there are Welsh and Scottish assemblies rests more with a political desire to secure the votes of many in those areas and less to do with real devolution.
This Island is too small to have umpteen parliaments with tax raisng power and legislative agendas.
Just as with Local Goverment, Central Goverment decides and locally the aurthorities act a agencies only. I see the role of the assemblies strictly along those lines until some future government puts a stop to all this unnessary expence and nonsence.
Complain about this comment
Message 55....
You must live in some sort of a kink in the space time continuum, ...'brought us to the brink of bankruptcy?'....
Please explain, in simple terms for us ignoramouses to understand, how this came about.. How YOU can totally ignore the fact that up until about twelve months ago the whole world was revelling in a welter of consumerist activity,
Whole nations were geared up to supply the goods demanded by the rest of the world, and every bank on the planet were bending over backwards to give out money for any purpose at all.
The in places unconnected, except by language and trade, to the UK, suddenly went into meltdown, the consequence of which the UK also went down into depression, what the government had to do with that is any one's guess. and you, being one of those 'any one's', guessed wrong.
The Tories would have been in the mire just as were/are Labour, and listening to their recent comments, I would hazard a guess and say, we would have been even deeper in it, than we are at present.
Was it you that said he does not have a TV set?
Well if it was, then your comments can be excused I suppose, if not you, then you must, as I said live, off world, where global news has yet to reach.
Complain about this comment
#54 West Wales
You fail to answer my question with anything other than more propaganda and misdirection.
In response to my question asking you to clarify where "draconian measures" had been enforced on local authorities in "wholly English-speaking communities" you provided the example of Milford Haven town council's request to opt out of implementing a Welsh Language Scheme. You reference a Wikipedia article.
a) These are not "draconian measures" as you put it, since - as the BBC article referenced by your Wikipedia source makes clear:
"Under the scheme rejected by the council, documents in Welsh would have to be provided only on demand, not as a matter of course."
So, if the community were entirely English-speaking, as you claimed, this would result in absolutely zero demand and zero cost.
b) Of course, the community is not entirely English-speaking (as the BBC article makes clear, if such clarification were necessary), but the BBC article also makes extremely clear that any demand would (in proportion to the numbers of the Welsh-speaking population) be extremely low, and so costs would also be extremely low (if there were any at all).
c) The BBC article also gives some indication of the scaremongering performed by the councillors who opposed this perfectly reasonable language scheme. The councillors used all kinds of hyperbole to suggest the costs which would be necessary were the scheme to be put in place, and yet, as I just said, this is shown to be nonsense.
The BBC continues to report that Councillor Eric Harries, after repeating the same arguments we hear on this thread time after time said, "I'm fully supportive of spending money on services that are needed, but not on services that are not needed or wanted."
And here he (as so many of the opponents of language equality) misses the point - the point is that no money would be spend *apart from* on services which were "needed or wanted".
This is why Milford Haven / Aberdaugleddau ultimately accepted their responsibilities to fairness, decency and to the language rights of their Welsh-speaking locals (however few in number).
Since, West-Wales, you can't provide any evidence of "Draconian measures" (not 'fair supply on demand') imposed on solely English-speaking communities (of which there are few, if any in Wales), may I suggest that you are seeing problems where none exist, and - further - that the arguments against legislation for Welsh-language rights are (often wilfully) based on false premises?
Complain about this comment
Vortigern1 at 59
You are correct - but that was part of the argument the MH council put to the WLB to allow it to be excused from having to put a scheme in place - unfortunately to no avail.
You will note the date of the report preceeds the date that the Council proposed a scheme as required by the WLB.
I have no idea whether or not the scheme has yet been approved.
Complain about this comment
On the whole a positive step - and does this £200,000 figure mean that all the big banks now have to provide a full service in Welsh? I hope so. They've had enough of our taxpayers money - now let's make them do something useful with it.
You've gotta laugh at the idiot Brits on here. It's alright for government to bail out rich elites and fickle financiers, but a few million quid to help protect our ancient and beautiful language causes howls of indignation. I'm confident that another step has been taken today to ensure that Cymraeg will still be here long after the UK and it's corrupt banking system has collapsed into the dust of oblivion.
:-)
Complain about this comment
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Let's abandon the WA, the WAG and the WLB...forget about being Welsh...and just be British.
Then we can all go on holiday abroad and be shunned for acting like the uncivilised, alcoholic, classless wasters that the world views "Brits" as. Apparently this is the culture we should aspire to as we'll get on in the world.
Then the stoned mason and Tipexx should be really happy.
Complain about this comment
For once I agree with Brynt 41 in that the welsh people should be allowed to direct expenditure on public services including welsh language. When welsh people will be asked if they support the obscene levels of taxation to provide S4C,let alone the English who provide vast majority the answer would be NO. Theres no doubt the creation of education through the welsh language in english speaking areas was a means whereby the "well off "welsh who invariably worked in public sector could have a virtually "private" educationat the expense of general taxpayers. It was a case like the "National Lottery" where the relative poor were subsiding well. Nobody as far as I know has explained the cost involved of this very divising education policy. There is no doubt that the progressive and insidious policies of Plaid Cymru/Welsh Language Society are driving the Assembly down the road of creating a totally welsh speaking population. If people wish to speak welsh that is their free right but to force us purely english speaking welsh to pay for services(including S4C) that we have no interst in at all is a disgrace. As I've said before there is no politician in Wales with the guts to stand up to the "welsh language"fanatics in an open manner as their all on the greasy pole which in little and insignificant Wales is about as high as a matchstick. Speaking to friends yesterday who all grew up in mid-glamorgan in an english only environment we were unanimous in our concerns about directions of public policy in Wales.You can see from the "blogs" here that there are quite dangerous divisions between welsh people at this time who in normal times might split between centre right/centre left and have perfectly amicable discussion about public policy,whereas now hostility exists because a minority are driving the majority in a direction that is inimical to their long term interests.
Complain about this comment
It is truly tragic when Lord Elis Thomas describes today as a "hugely important" event in Wales.
This just sums up how narrow minded and out of touch this man and his Nationalist colleagues are with the realities of life in Wales and the rest of the UK.
Frankly, it is a disgrace that they (THE FEW) should regard this as some defining moment, when families up and down Wales (THE MANY) have immediate existential concerns like whether the household will have an income next week, whether they will have enough food on the table, and enough money to buy clothes for the children etc.
It beggars belief that they should be swooning in the aisles about this Language LCO, a meaningless bit of Mumbo Jumbo to the average citizen of Wales.
To put the whole thing in perspective, just look at what Lord Elis Thomas and his Nationalist friends (THE FEW) are focused on, while the Prime Minister meets with the Premier of the largest emerging ecomnomy, looking to boost trade and help pull us out of the world recession.
I know who and what is likely to make the biggest impact on the lives of thousands of people up and down Wales (THE MANY).
Complain about this comment
Re 52
Ah, yes, the language of the hearth of course! It should know its place. I think I'm much happier than you today, actually.
And, LordBeddGelert, still no answer to my question, I see ...
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr at 64 - no use trying to explain to you anymore - as with all who loose an argument you resort to insults and silly prevarications and objections.
Just look up the WLB's three Standard Welsh Language scheme for Town and Community Councils and read the one for English speaking areas.
Save me wasting my time explaining.
I'm sure you can find the link for yourself :)
Complain about this comment
I'm glad Snoutsintrough thinks that Plaid and the Welsh Language Society's policies are progressive.
And I note that Shrek-Girl is very keen to be best mates with the Chinese Premier who couldn't give a damn about the rights of ordinary working people - anywhere!
Complain about this comment
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Having been out ......
I notice that puredrivelagain, with daverodway the caped crusader, insinuate that I am a drug taker, not so, if I knew who you both were I would take legal action, what type of person would call another "drug adict" ....... looser comes to mind, but no, my daughter said "sad".
A point of order I am a Stonemason.
Back to the LCO .......
If all that was required was being able to use Welsh in your everyday life, the answer lies in your wallet, don't spend with those that prefer not to speak Welsh, eventually the survival of the fittest would prevail, you tell us about the rapid uptake of Welsh, put your money where your keyboard is.
But the intentions of the "Cardiff Bay" political elite, and associates, is the garnering of power, and the simplest method is to create a small political pond that will support a political elite, and that is what is happening, this LCO creates a foundation from which an "Elite" can spring.
We, the electorate on the other hand, are expected to stand back while the destruction of our constitution begins in earnest, saying nothing that might offend the thin skinned Nationalists.
It's not going to happen, there are to many who see through the WAGocracy.
Complain about this comment
West Wales #73
"Bostoniwr at 64 - no use trying to explain to you anymore - as with all who loose an argument you resort to insults and silly prevarications and objections."
Hang on a minute - my post clearly demonstrated, point by point, where your argument was unsound. To repeat the basics.
i) You claimed "draconian measures" imposed on "wholly English speaking areas"
ii) I asked you to clarify since you responded with some misguided reference to a partly Welsh-speaking town in Pembrokeshire
iii) you refused to address a single one of my points, claiming rather that I had lost the argument and insulted you!
Please explain - and, also please show where you find a single "insult" in my post. I suggested you were seeing problems where there are none. You also seem to be inventing insults as well.
Complain about this comment
Is language a tool for better communication or is it something that must be actuated for its own sake, for a normative identity?
Complain about this comment
#62 Geoffrey Bastin
Wales' political status historically has been decided by England. Even before the conquest in the late thirteenth century, the Welsh princes were forced to swear allegiance to the English Crown. The conquest of Wales resulted in an imposed English prince, a tradition continues.
Subsequently, by the Act of Union, 1536 (passed by the English Parliament) in which there were no representatives from Wales, the entire country was annexed, and 'forever' became subject to the English Crown. In effect, Wales became England's first colony in these islands.
In 1542, by another Act, the laws of England were applied to Wales, as they still are... again by the English Parliament. English judges passed judgements in the royal courts of the English Crown. English justices or magistrates were appointed. Wales was divided into counties or shires, in the same manner as England. English was made the language of government, administration and the courts, but not of the ordinary people of Wales, who for the most part spoke only their native tongue. By these measures the populace was taught that English was superior to Welsh. A belief which has persisted down to today. Its alive and well among a small number of loud-mouthed bigots in this forum.
The process of anglicisation continued down the centuries. Proof that Welsh was the language of the people is illustrated by the need for the Bible to be translated into Welsh during the late Elizabethan period, as most people were unable to understand English. Its translation was not a sign of concern for the Language, but rather for the salvation of souls by a Protestant monarchy and government.
In the modern period, the language and nonconformist religion of Wales were accused of being the reasons why Wales and the Welsh people were considered 'backward' by English anglicans - refer to the Treachery of the Blue Books, 1847.
Nation states, in the modern sense, did not come into being until the nineteenth century. The UK is not that old, it dates back only to the Acts of Union of Scotland and Ireland (1707 and 1801). Democracy in these islands did not exist in any shape or form until 1832, and universal adult suffrage not until 1928.
So when you say that Wales has never been a nation state, you are only talking about a relatively short period of time. Wales came quite close to achieving self-determination in the late nineteenth century. For most, if not all of the democratic era, there has been a movement in Wales which has aimed for self-government (Cymru Fydd in the 19th C and Plaid Cymru in the 20th C).
Many nation states are artificial constructs, with borders drawn arbitrarily. One could cite dozens of examples in Africa, the Middle East, Asia and South America, for example. whereas Wales is geographically well-defined and much more cohesive.
It is clearly not a nation state, and if you read my words carefully (as you obviously did not) you would see that I did not make that claim for our country.
Wales does however have the attributes of nationhood. It has a native language, and a distinct culture. It has a people, who, when asked, describe themselves as 'Welsh'. They may say they're 'Welsh' and 'British', but usually, its 'Welsh' first. That Wales is not simply a region has been recognised in so many ways, we have for example, a National Library and Museum, and a National Eisteddfod. BY the way, English is not the 'native' language of Wales. It has become the dominant language, but that was not achieved entirely consensually.
"Wales is only a Principality"
If that 'only' isn't a put-down to the people of Wales, I don't know what is. Thankfully the term 'principality' is rarely used nowadays, because of its less savoury historical connotations. I very much doubt whether another investiture will ever take place. Wales has moved on, and there is definitely more evident pride in being Welsh. Subservience is no longer on the Welsh menu
Where I might agree with you is that it is unlikely, certainly within my lifetime, that Wales will have self-determination. Of its three million people, one million were not born in Wales. Many were born in England, and have come here to live here for varying reasons - to work, to retire, etc. I would expect that a large number of such immigrants would oppose the move to self-government because of their close ties with family across the border, for example. This fact alone would make it difficult to persuade a majority to accept the idea, but it is not inconceivable.
The people of Wales will be faced with a dilemma at the next general election. They have a choice between a failed Labour party which has lost touch with its radical roots, and, as far as Wales is concerned, an 'alien' Tory party. Both these parties have failed Wales badly. So who do these disillusioned voters turn to? There are only a few alternatives, and Plaid Cymru is one of those.
I don't see why an English Parliament should decide the future of the Welsh Language when there exists a democratically elected body in Wales. No decision about the Language can be taken without a majority of our representatives voting for it. The proposals mainly concern the rights of those people who speak Welsh. It says nothing about forcing people to learn it. I think that all of us are agreed that any efforts to do that would be madness.
The way forward has to be consensual, that's what democracy is all about. Its also about protecting the rights of minorities. In talking about majorities on this blog, its easy to forget that the minority have rights that shouldn't be trampled on.
Perhaps if you read a little more history, we would be subjected to less of your poorly informed opinion.
Complain about this comment
Brynt 41 said in his atavistic diatribe said:
"The proposals mainly concern the rights of those people who speak Welsh. "
No wonder we have a problem. In your ecstatic state of anticipation at this hugely momentous piece of legislation that will transform the lives of people living in Wales, you make a fundamental error which betrays your real agenda.
This is all about, as an earlier contributor noted, the creation of a cadre of "Crachach Elites" who will boss people living in Wales.
Make no mistake, this so-called "we only want a truly bilingual Wales" is the biggest lie out there. All you have to do to see what Wales will look like is go to Gwynedd and try to survive as a non-Welsh speaking person. Good luck to you!
Your long anachronistic prose does not contain the word British, but rather keeps referring to the "English" Parliament. Your hatred of "outsiders" is plain to see, and further confirms my worst fears about the real agenda driven by those Crachach Elite, who hide in the shadows, waiting for their day, when they can drive the people in Wales with one leash.
Never in the field of modern communications is so much taken from the many by the few! - if these powers were ever to get transferred to Cardiff.
Complain about this comment
Today the Cybernats are at work trying to swamp discussions about the WL LCO, as they have been doing for a while now, fallacious argument, half truths, insults .....
..... yesterday I submitted a petition to the Welsh Assembly ......
"That a referendum for Independence would require 95% of the electorate to vote in its favour".
It hasn't been approved as yet, today's snow has probably delayed the process ....
How many would support this proposition in the WAG.
Complain about this comment
Wow!
This blog is indeed a dangerous, contagious place.
ShrekGirl hasn't been here five minutes and already she's sounding like Mapexx on cocaine (though not quite Mapexx... somebody else... angrier... less rational... I wonder...).
Interesting choice of name, "ShrekGirl", taken from the German "Schreck" meaning 'fear, alarm, horror, etc.'. Lets take 'girl' as an agent noun and we get something like fear-maker... scaremongerer, perhaps.
Certainly scary ideas, though - possibly rabid. Is it a full moon tonight?
;)
Seriously though - calm down, you're being extremely paranoid. Think about it a while longer and you'll see all these fears are ungrounded (as I recently demonstrated in microcosm with regards to the Milford Haven scare story raised by WestWales).
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr at 77
Apologies you did not insult me - however your comments are largely prevarications and silly objections.
1/ [You claimed "draconian measures" imposed on "wholly English speaking areas]
I gave you two extracts from the Welsh Language Scheme together with the potential and actual impact.
I could have given you more.
If you consider it highly unlikely a charge would be made against the council for putting Mrs Jones scribbled request on the board I would agree - but the point is it would be illegal.
The cost for bilingual news adverts is accurate.
The comment regarding the Historical Society is fact, that is exactly the requirement, the display must be bilingual.
As is the requirement that websites must be bilingual.
However I note -yrieithydd- at 58 says
[Given that the Vale of Glamorgan council scheme doesn't aim to provide a fully bilingual website]
I will pass that information on to the relevant Community Council it may help by giving them something to base renegotiation of their scheme on.
2/ [I asked you to clarify since you responded with some misguided reference to a partly Welsh-speaking town in Pembrokeshire]
The link and reference to Milford Haven was to answer your earlier request at 45
[Is there actually any evidence of "wholly English Speaking communities" being forced by the WLB] the link said "allegedly .....about 10 Welsh councils"
In this case for Welsh read Pembrokeshire, (in fact I believe there were more)
I would question a lot of the comments and statements in the BBC report - for instance the requirement of the scheme the Council were opposed to was much more extensive that simply producing copies of minutes and agendas on request.
Also the impression that there was strong support for imposing the scheme in MH there was not.
Milford Haven have always offered translation of key documents on demand, so that was no problem, and was in fact part of their case presented to the WLB that despite offering the facility they had had no requests in 14 years.
The WLB give the proportion of Welsh speakers in Milford Haven as 6.6%.
However the town and area is wholly English speaking.
While some individuals can speak Welsh, just as some can speak French - the language of the community is English and the culture Pembrokeshire.
The reason The Council objected to accepting a scheme was I understand cost.
The scheme covers an awful lot more and requires significant expenditure that does not depend on people making requests - it has to be done.
For a large Council like Milford Haven that cost can be largely absorbed - for a small Community Council it cannot and has to be funded by an increase in the Precept.
if you want all the details of the MH scheme requirement - as I suggested above - go on the WLB website and find the Template for the Standard Welsh Language Scheme for predominantly English speaking areas.
You seem to have difficulty in accepting what I say.
These schemes are draconian in that they impose unnecessary cost, complicated bureaucracy, duplication, and a requirement to employ translation services, irrespective of whether or not anyone wants them - and as I pointed out earlier have a negative impact on Community activities.
The other point you should consider is that South Pembrokeshire has its own Culture, going back some 1000 years.
These schemes take no account of that, and in fact appear to be intended to destroy that culture and replace it with the preferred idealised WLB Welsh culture and language.
Complain about this comment
no.81:
"Today the Cybernats are at work trying to swamp discussions about the WL LCO, as they have been doing for a while now, fallacious argument, half truths, insults ....."
How utterly galling. It is of course the preserve of the British Nationalists to swamp Betsan's blog with fallacious argument, half truths, insults...
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr at 82
[as I recently demonstrated in microcosm with regards to the Milford Haven scare story raised by WestWales]
What you demonstrated was something entirely different - work it out for youself :))
Complain about this comment
#80
"...referring to the "English" Parliament."
What else is it?
It has an overwhelming perpetual majority of members elected in England. Its language is English. It sits in England. It creates the laws of England. The Scottish Parliament was subsumed into it and ceased to exist. The Irish decided they wanted out and are not part of it.
If you describe my words as a 'diatribe', then what word would describe your quite vitriolic comment? You seem to be more anti-Welsh than you accuse me of being anti-English, which I am not. In fact, I am probably more 'English' than you are. I simply described what has happened to Wales during the last 700 or so years. If you wish to take issue with any of those, please do.
Again, some people see what they want to see. You might apologise for saying that the word 'British' is not contained in my comment... when it is.
Much of what I wrote referred to the period before 1707 and the Union with Scotland, when of course it was England. Britain as a political entity did not exist.
You are clearly a believer in conspiracy theories. I know of no hidden agenda or of elites who wield power from behind the scenes in Wales. As for Plaid, it is the junior partner in a coalition in what is a very weak institution.
The Welsh Language LCO seeks in essence to do three things:
1. To confirm the official status of both Welsh and English,
2. To ensure Linguistic rights for Welsh speakers whilst receiving services, and
3. To allow the establishment of a Welsh Language Commissioner to protect those rights.
That is what the Assembly Government, not Plaid alone, has decided to request the permission of the UK Parliament for powers to legislate on. The range of services in question is very narrow indeed, as it is. Almost certainly these proposals will be further watered down during the process of scrutiny, which will take an extended period. If there is a general election in the meantime, the entire process will have to start from scratch.
If the LCO is eventually approved, then any legislative Measures will have to be democratically approved by a majority in the Assembly. That will mean that at least two or more parties (as the current Assembly is constituted) will have to vote for them. No room for conspiracies.
English is the dominant language in Wales, as we are continually reminded by one or two people here, and as if we didn't already know. The Welsh Language, because of the dominance of English is under threat, not the other way around. Those who speak it, and to whom it is precious, want to see their language survive. They don't want it rammed down anyone's throats. That would be counterproductive. They are a minority like other minorities who already have their rights protected. If Wales ever becomes a bilingual country in the sense that most people here speak both languages, then it will take a very long time, and it will be by voluntary effort and persuasion. There is already a broad consensus among all the parties in Wales that it would be a good thing.
The process will be consensual and democratic. It cannot be otherwise.
Complain about this comment
Message 82.....
Thanks for aligning me with Shrek Girl, who I would say takes her Nicky from the animation character, so if I were you I'd be very careful what you say about her, because, just in case you don't know that character, he's something like the 'Hulk'
Big and bloody dangerous.
Anyway, now to speak to herself, I am very pleased to see another 'new kid on the block', and am happy to say that the numbers are gradually creeping up.
I am also happy to think you may be also expressing your antipathy to all this nationalistic crap, towards your family, friends, and neighbors, as I am doing.
The overextended messages from some on here, which are filled with 'historical bunk', and JUNK, is the expose of their mindset.
Can you imagine us, modern 21st century people being ruled by such people with their false culture and their language being used as a political weapon with which to beat us into submission, and back to their 'golden days' of the never was nation state of Wales, or should that be Cymru?
Keep it UP Shrek, Shriek it as loud and as long as you feel able to.
Sooner or later the numbers will grow, to enable us to present a far larger majority in favour of scrapping the lot of this rubbish political nonsense, than the feeble and diminishing numbers, for it to remain..
Complain about this comment
*5 West-Wales well boo hoo, you're leaving us? Good ridence, the more people who have the same mind-frame as you who leave, the better. Equality's scary isn't it? *31 Please get it right, it was 1993 WLA, don't you just hate when people get their facts wrong. *54 a nomber of councils and businesses wanted to opt-out of disability laws too, shall we allow them? Save them a fortune.
*7 Noah_sembly I think you'll find that all political systems sound that way as they are asked to by the UK government. Let me remind you that it is the UK government that got us in this mess and it is the 'UK' that is the worst developed state in this recession; not the Assembly's fault, but Westminster. Also Labour and Plaid agreed on the One Wales document; sorry did you want to see hospitals close, as that was the plans under Labour, Plaid actually stopped this. If Plaid was so unpopular why would the FBU change it's allegiance to them from Labour? Plaid voted against increase in AMs pay, but it was the other parties that voted for it.
*12 Huxleypiguk I'm sorry, but don't you think that the telecommunications industry is big enough to support equality? They make emmence amounts of profits; do you prefer them having their call centres in India? I worked for BT and that's where my job went. You state 'TV station' that they receive money from the WAG; money comes from Westminster, the WAG has no responsibility over broadcasting. Many industries have public funding, just look at the car, banking and manufacturing industries at the moment.
*13 mapexx another bunch of drivel by the one and only. Why are you putting cost on equality? That's what people did too regarding disabled people, should we reverse that equality? It is not just about cost but the right to use the native language of this nation and preserving our culture, whether you're Welsh speaking or not (like me). *18 'Note, ....I did not disparage the language one single time.' apart from when you stated this rubbish! *42 there would not be Welsh speakers in offices just answering Welsh calls, just look at Traveline, they answer Welsh and English, the same for BT. You state the majority don't care, but have you asked every single person. I speak English, I would like to see all people equal. You state kids from Ysgol Gymraeg revert back to English, I know many who do not. Where I am studying at the moment the majority of Welsh speaking students speak Welsh at nearly every point in their daily lives, don't suspect or pressume. *48 'Language use, which is NOT in any way banned' sorry did you not see the news of Thomas Cook? Have you tried calling up a utility company and speaking Welsh? They can not use their language. The businesses that have services do not promote these like they do the English ones. I've spoken to many people who didn't even know there was a Welsh language directory enquiries service, I did as I worked for BT; Welsh speakers do not use present services as they do not know they exist. And actually in France, German is not a minority language, but you do see it on their signs. You can actually say this for many nations around the world, shows how uncultured you really are, not just uncultured here. *61 'invisible culture' well there's ignorant of you. You say we should learn a foreign language, well you can actually learn this too in school; but do you think kids are happy to learn them? How many children leave school speaking those foreign languages? They have more opportunities here with English and Welsh.
*15 TheStonemason the end of the coalition? Maybe, but then we'd see a Plaid led government backed up by the Tories and Libs; is that better for you??? *20 the Post Offices are SMEs, what tripe you talk. In fact they are all owned by Post Office ltd, which is owned by Royal Mail, which in turn is owned by UK plc; get your facts right. *29 Plaid predominately? Hardly when it is a cross party agreement in the Assembly.
*21 Lord Bedd Gelert it's a sad sad day to see a Welsh speaker prefer to see their language die. Our forefathers before fought for independence as it was then and fought to keep the language alive, which is why it is still here even after nearly 500 years of subjugation. *28 'rubbing along just fine'??? Like the Rebecca Riots, Newport and Merthyr Riots, Tryweryn, LNG, S4C, Mines, etc. Yes we were all living peacefully together; good one your highness. *32 I love how you state forced down the throats, who's exactly? The greedy businesses who get millions of pounds in profits? It is giving the average Joe the right to choose and speak whichever language they wish.
*33 ianapharri totally agree. The telecommunications industry is indeed transnational. I worked in both Vodafone and Orange and have been with '3'; all three of these companies provide services in other states, such as Spain, Italy, France, etc.
*38 sanity4all what are you on about? The police are not going to police this, it is the job of the commissioner. Who is in charge of Scots Gaelic? The Scottish Parliament, surely this should be the same for Welsh?
*51 janchild well thank goodness we got rid of you then. You come here and say you wanted to learn the language, then when we promote it you don't like it??? Your kid(s) were never forced to speak Welsh, I bet they spoke English in their everyday lives. It is the right of the Welsh speakers to have equality, I bet you for one didn't want equality for ethnics either, for your attitude is indeed a xenophobic and racist one, good ridence to you too.
*56 Cardiffian2008 you give Cardiffians a bad name. The Welsh have been fighting for their language since it was banned in 1536. People have gone to jail for refusing to use English when all they could speak was Welsh. Gwynfor went on hunger strike for the promised S4C. Many fights have been had long before devolution.
*60 TheFlyer Why? Because people believe in equality for everyone and rights of people to choose their language in Wales. Cost? Is down to the big businesses who make stupid amounts of profits and the costs are minimal, most have businesses in other countries. Who gains/loses? Well there are no losers really. The people who gain are those who feel comfortable speaking in their mother tongue or who have learnt it and wish to use it. Recession? Well yes we are in a recession (which Brown denied a while ago), but this LCO would not be agreed for a while yet; months and months down the line thanks to the complication that is LCOs from the UK government.
*62 Geoffrey Bastin the devolved governments were democratically elected in, unlike some British institutions like the Lords. Wales is a Principality indeed, but there were many states run by princes which were called nations too. Wales is a nation and Welsh is her nationality. Wales is also a state, but just not a recognised state as rules set down by the UN; but it is almost there.
*70 Snoutsintrough you make me laugh, do you think Welsh speakers want to fund your English channels? Have you looked into Plaid politics before? Probably not; Plaid in the last count had 52% English speaking only members including myself. We also have English born politicians and the same can be said for the Welsh Language Society; check your stats.
*71 Shrek-Girl I don't believe you have any idea what you are talking about. Do you not believe in equality? The disabled are the few, homosexuals are the few, ethnics are the few. There's a 'political' party out there for you, it's called BNP. Plaid Cymru is the party of all in Wales, whoever makes Wales their home, no matter what religion, sex, sexual orientation, race, ability, langauge, etc. We are only seeking equality.
Complain about this comment
#83 West-Wales wrote:
"The other point you should consider is that South Pembrokeshire has its own Culture, going back some 1000 years.
These schemes take no account of that, and in fact appear to be intended to destroy that culture and replace it with the preferred idealised WLB Welsh culture and language."
Its ok that it happened to Wales, but it mustn't happen to S Pembs. Your comment could well read like this:
'The other point you should consider is that Wales has its own Culture, going back some 1600 years.
Its Language and culture has (largely) been destroyed and replaced by the idealised English culture and language.'
I agree, two wrongs don't make a right. Policies on the Welsh Language should be implemented with sensitivity, and I'm sure they will be. There many vested interests which will ensure that they are. The difference between us is that you can only see things from your point of view. In any case, the problems you refer to are nothing to do with the LCO application, but with existing legislation passed by Westminster.
That is the advantage of having devolved powers. Legislation will be made by people who have a better knowledge of Wales and its people, and the structure of communities, and their history. We have an opportunity to have better government. I challenge you to demonstrate that we have had good government in Wales, or indeed anywhere, under the traditional UK system.
Complain about this comment
# 83 WestWales:
"South Pembrokeshire has its own Culture, going back some 1000 years.
These schemes take no account of that, and in fact appear to be intended to destroy that culture and replace it with the preferred idealised WLB Welsh culture and language."
Your argument may therefore be paraphrased:
i) cultures and languages which have been present in areas for a minimum of 1000 years should be maintained.
ii) if recent years have seen an incursion of people speaking another language into the area, this can be ignored - the 1000-year old language must have 100% priority
iii) no legal or other measures should be taken to provide the speakers of the newly-arrived language with rights to use it in education or communication.
OK. You're talking about English (old) vs Welsh (new) in Pembrokeshire. If we apply this rationale to Welsh (old) vs English (very new) over the whole of Wales we end up with English being allowed to be used in three parts of Wales:
a) Pembrokeshire south of the Landsker
b) a few other very small pockets of the southern lowlands (mainly around Herefordshire) and
c) perhaps one or two villages outside Wrexham
Not even Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg are asking for that!
WestWales, you show us the way forward!
Complain about this comment
*76 Stonemason well statistics show that Welsh is increasing not just in young people, but adults too and the people of Wales voted for an Assembly and you'll see that people will want to vote in a Parliament as people see the unfairness we Welsh have been given compared to Scotland and Northern Ireland. *81 95% must vote for independence; that's obviously not taking the Welsh into account then when 1/3 of people here was born outside Wales; yes there's fairness for the Welsh people. Maybe you need 95% of people to vote in a party or to allow disabled people to have access to buildings or to vote on whether to keep benefits or even to go to war; your arguments are quite boring.
*80 Shrek Girl you obviously know nothing about living in Gwynedd then as 30% ish speak only English, they live side by side and are still there.
*83 West_Wales Pembrokeshire has its own culture? Are you saying it's not part of Wales and her culture? Maybe you're thinking of the Irish immigrants to Pembrokeshire; why do you want Gaelic to be their language instead? Are you stating that areas in France where the majority speak German then German should be the language there not bilingualism as it is still in France; which you could also state for other regions of France, Germany, Spain, actually nearly every European state. These states know there are bilingual citizens in these areas which is why they do not ban the language and the majority of the time they have the language there on their signs, in their businesses and guess what, with no complaints.
Complain about this comment
Listen Cymro82, with your mega-long answers, you're giving Betsan, or her moderator, a hard time;) :)
You have twisted my point. When I speak of THE FEW, you know very well that I refer to the "Crachach Elite", who have their very high profile figures, whom I imagine most readers will already know, and their fellow-cadres, lurking in the shadows, waiting for their opportunity.
Of course, Plaid Cymru will say this is all about fairness and equality but in truth that is a travesty. People living in Wales need to be shown that this is an almighty TROJAN horse, which Mr Elis Thomas describes as a "hugely important " day for Wales.
This is all built on an invented tradition of defeat by the "monster" called England pregnant with mounds of myth to perpetuate a political goal of the FEW to advance the Restoration of a power lost centuries ago.
As I said earlier, if the people want a glimpse of what Wales would be like under Plaid Cymru, armed with the power to legislate the language, just take a trip through the snow capped mountains of Snowdonia to the Kingdom of Plaid Cymru Gwynedd.
Those who want to live in a modern 21st Century Wales, one which wants to compete in the world and reach out to other economies, don't want this anachronistic narrative built on a false sense of inferiority and victimhood!
Look out, not inward, be confident, people of Wales, go out into the world. The winners will be international, cosmopolitan. There is your oyster, there is your future!
Be strong, be bold, be adventurous.....seize the day
Complain about this comment
Shrek-Girl
Your last message (#92) contains not a single verifiable fact. It's all bluster, and as such it's impossible to address any of your issues (since you don't show them in any logical way).
Could I ask for some flesh to be put on your skeleton of Gwynedd-phobia?
What (in reasonable and rational detail, rather than wild and nebulous rhetoric) is so terrible about Gwynedd?
One thing I will say about your rhetoric, though - it is interesting (and extremely troubling - 'schrecklich' in German even) that you complain about there being one single place on the face of the planet (Gwynedd, you say) where the Welsh language is still strong, as if you were lamenting the fact that the onslaught of imperial English hadn't done its job properly and completed the eradication. As if almost all the rest of these islands (and much of three continents) weren't enough for you.
If I may draw a colourful but significant parallel, you sound like an Israeli moaning that when he goes to Gaza those damned Palestinians insist on speaking Arabic.
There are no bombs or rockets in Wales (diolch byth) - do not take my analogy too far - but there is a once-strong language reduced to a small minority by its neighbour but which is still being told by many that it has no right to ask for a break.
Your last few paragraphs suggest that you're joking (they surely can't be taken seriously), but you should perhaps be aware that words like yours in many corners of the world would not be seen as a harmless joke. Indeed, in any context they are deeply irresponsible.
I repeat my question, though, because I am interested in the source of your hatred of Gwynedd - could you give some details, please?
Complain about this comment
And on an even more serious note (two in fact):
i) does anybody know where a copy of the full text of this LCO is available online? It would be useful to be able to refer to the facts of the matter.
ii) does anybody know where this issue is being discussed sensibly and reasonably, without the baiting and biting that we have on this thread?
If there is nowhere else to go to find serious discussion [I unfortunately live abroad, and this limits my own possibilities], might I ask that contributors to this thread (all of us) try to stop the ad hominem attacks and wild vitriol, and allow a useful discussion to develop which might help understand the situation - and each other's perspectives - better?
thanks for any advice - this is an important issue, and it's not being done any justice on this blog-discussion. In fact, the tone of the discussion at present strikes me as an insult not only to the issue and to the wider question of informed debate, but also to the host, Betsan Powys.
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr, the LCO is on-line at .....
[Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]
Not sure if the moderators will allow the link.
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr, the LCO is on-line at .....
The long way to the document .....
Go to the National Assembly for Wales web site.
On the left hand side select "legislation"
Middle bottom .....
"Details of all LCOs laid before the Assembly can be found here." with arrow to select.
file is 6th in list.
It's a bit much Betsan that a reference to the Welsh Assembly is not allowed.
Complain about this comment
Dear Bostoniwr,
I see that my germane points are getting under your skin, so you resort to trying to silence me by hints to Betsan, and threats to look elsewhere on the blogosphere.
It is so clear that you are losing the argument already, and so seek the refuge of attacking the messenger.
The truth is there is no need to dress up this discussion in hideously long, monolithic paragraphs of anodyne historic analysis, for that way leads down a cul-de-sac.
This whole issue is a Nationalist Trojan Horse aimed at irrevocably resetting the social, political and economic landscape of Wales.
You fear that the wider population will get wind of the true intent of your ambitions. Have no fear, they will be enlightened.
Do you know something, Bostoniwr? The real Welsh-speaking Welsh have no time for this nonsense, they are happy because they can already speak the language whenever and wherever they want.
No, this is something entirely different. It is not about rights and equality of a population in a 21 century setting; it is about the Master Plan of control of the Many by the Elite Crachach Few, who yearn for the romantic age of the Gwynedd Princes, and want to create an indentity predicated on "otherness", particularly to England.
And that control will be articulated through the prism of the Welsh Language, where all who stand up to it will be censored.
That is the LCO Trojan Horse.
Complain about this comment
Here are some keywords that may be of interest to those wanting to know more about this real issues. This list is of course not exhaustive:
lingusitic chauvinism, lingusitic protectionism, crachach, nationalism, elitism, exclusion, control freakery, trojan horse, LCO, hidden agenda, atavistic, anachronism, romanticism, invented tradition, inward looking
Complain about this comment
And here's an alternate set of keywords to add balance to the Britnats hystrionic labelling:
equality, real tradition, unifying force, gwerin, simple patriotism, history, realism, anti-imperialism, community-driven, world language, inclusion, our children
THE FUTURE!
Complain about this comment
Re 97
Please, please, please Shrek-Girl, can you be the exception amongst the British Nationalists in these debates and answer the direct question that Bostoniwr has set you?
Complain about this comment
Message 88....
You are a one! I do not put 'cost on equality', if you take the PC propaganda out of you eyes and look, read, and most importantly, COMPREHEND what is before your face, you may come to understand what is being said by virtually everyone who counters your messages.
There is no cost on equality, as the equality is already there.
IT is the likes of you that tells the world the language is 'disabled', it is the likes of you that will, in fact, and in time, cripple the language, by your demands it be placed on a pedestal.
The bulk of the population do not clamour for it, as can be seen by their total indifference to it.
What I put a cost on, is the overblown attempts by those who are seeking that fairyland called Cymru to be exchanged for
MY homeland, which is WALES. The 'native' language of which region is English.
The current climate is quite satisfactory to the vast bulk of the population of this region, because if it was not, there would be far more involving themselves in the political day to day happenings, here in this region.
They are not doing so, for the very obvious reason they could not give a toss about the whole sorry mess you are trying to foist on them.
Now, you are the one asking for FACTS, so let us see you show that what I have just written is not a fact.
It patently is, otherwise I would not be so emphatic in stating it to be a fact.
IF you are so enamoured of the opposite, then latch on to my coat tails and demand a total and compulsory mandated referendum, putting the simple question,...
.... do you want Wales to be totally self governing, with all that implies?...
A secure eastern border with check points and a bloody great long unscalable fence, loss of state subsidies to underpin our newly created, but impoverished, economy, every little bit of business conducted in Cymraeg, all schools to be solely Cymraeg, with the odd half hour English lesson lined up against similar timed French, German or whatever other language that will be set.
Ambassadorial expeditions into the big wide world outside to try to persuade multinational firms to come here, with the underlying, and covert, promise that our workforce will undercut those in India and China.
Massive taxation to pay for all this, whilst we get on our economic feet, speaking Cymraeg of course, extra costs involved in transporting whatever it is we may actually get to produce, with the new barrier of England, now a foreign country, to be transversed, and no doubt it will cost, as England will not want to have it's roads worn away without some contribution towards maintenance.
Or alternatively, transport by sea or air, with all the extra costs involved in those.
The list of problems upcoming is endless.
None of which you Cymro have taken into account.
You forget that England is not just a neighbour, but is the means to your daily financial survival.
But by all means carry on regardless, keep up the demands for the language supremacy you are obviously calling for.
The more you do so, the less likelihood there will be of you getting it.
Reaction will kick in soon enough, and it will not be to your advantage.
Complain about this comment
Shrek girl... you seem to have arrived on this blog with a bang and have the nationalists on the run.
Interestingly you touch upon a point that I have long suspected. Your typical welsh speaking farmer in Cardigan, although they would agree in principle with further powers (maybe we all would if we knew it was going to be exploited by fanatics), do not really lose much sleep over this issue! Thats because none of this is designed to help the average welsh speaker in a welsh speaking community.... it's not going to improve their quality of life at all. They already live their lives through the medium of Welsh and receive welsh billing for most of their utilities. Do you really thinksuch people would stay up all night campaigning on the internet so they could speak to Vodafone in Welsh when they ring them probably once a year?!?!
That is the sinister and glaringly obvious thing and it amazes me how you nationalists can deny it. It is not about making quality of life better, it is about exploiting the language as a political tool which in turn will make us more different from the england you all despise and take us one step closer to independence. Well not on my (or many other's i suspect) watch because you cant even organise an impartial, well run, democratic meeting on further powers so how the heck are you going to run a whole country?!? Wasnt it iceland you all upheld as an example for an Independent Wales!? LOL
Complain about this comment
Re 101
Delusion or anger? That is the question.
You said :
"A secure eastern border with check points and a bloody great long unscalable fence, loss of state subsidies to underpin our newly created, but impoverished, economy, every little bit of business conducted in Cymraeg, all schools to be solely Cymraeg, with the odd half hour English lesson lined up against similar timed French, German or whatever other language that will be set."
Ah, yes, facts! No, mapexx bach, YOU are a one. But, seriously, what is the point of talking to someone who has lost grip of reality?
Can any of the other British Nationalists defend mapexx's statement above, or are they prepared to condemn it?
Complain about this comment
99. At 09:52am on 03 Feb 2009, Draig32 wrote:
And here's an alternate set of keywords to add balance to the Britnats hystrionic labelling:
equality, real tradition, unifying force, gwerin, simple patriotism, history, realism, anti-imperialism, community-driven, world language, inclusion, our children
THE FUTURE!
**********************************************************************
Draig 32, as a long time doubter of your sanity I am relieved at last, that your latest ranting has finally confirmed my suspicions.
Complain about this comment
World leaders now the dangers of protectionism when we are in a global recession.
There are many forms of protectionism, and they all in their own way lead to serious economic damage to the very people least able to protect themselves - a bit ironic, isn't it!
And at this time when we all need to look outwards and build bridges, ease channels of communciation, facilitate commerce, create more jobs, strengthen our businesses, be ready for the upswing, what do we get?
Plaid Cymru getting all hot under the collar about the Welsh Language LCO. And just read this quote from the modern day "King of Gwynedd" :
“The Welsh language belongs to everybody in Wales. It’s a mark of our identity and we should be rightly proud of it and be boasting about it – not seeing it as an impediment or a problem.”
Could have been a quote from the 1200's couldn't it, or maybe the 1400's.
This is the atavism that sends shivers down my spine.
Listen King Fred, language (any language) belongs to no-one. It is not a "historic and holy relic" but a means of communication which enables people to go about their lives.
When a Taiwanese student speaks English, she doesn't think that she owns English. She simply realises that if she wants to communicate with the millions across the globe, this is the means to achieve that end.
And when a Turkish or Chilean or Polish businessman speaks in English, he does it because he can close business that he otherwise would not be able to do. He doesn't want to come to Wales and find he needs to incur the expense of hiring a Polish-Welsh translator to conduct business.
If so, he'll go to Scotland or Ireland or England. Now do you get it!
The LCO is a Plaid Cymru Trojan Horse, Beware, remember the lessons of history!!
Complain about this comment
Fi Dafydd,
Good spot on 101, sheer lunacy and blatant uneducated scare mongering. Typical Unionist rhetoric.
I'd ignore Shrek-Girl if I were you, from the style of writing and sporadic of CAPITALS in her sentences, she sounds EXACTLY like Mapexx. Wouldn't surprise me if they were the same person.
Complain about this comment
Re 105
In many ways it's a wonderful world - snow outside, and the British Nationalists in a foul mood!
Somehow I don't think it's Plaid who are getting hot under the collar about the LCO.
I take it I'm not going to get an answer from any of the British Nationalists when I ask what parliament anywhere in the world restricts itself to one topic at a time? Of course I'm not, silly me!
And it's snowing even more - wonderful!
Complain about this comment
puredrivel 106....
I see, so ignore anyone who has an opposing view to yourself and if you really do have to acknowledge it then it must all be emanating from the same person. That is the hall mark of a blinkered Welsh nationalist. I wonder if it is the same technique that has enabled the one wales government to start taking our country down a path that judging by this forum (and in particular the recent Radio Wales call in yesterday), the majority of people in this country do not want or need.
Now as many gem terms as Mappex has coined.... do you really think if he had thought up the incredibly articulate description of the LCO as a 'trojan horse' he would have waited all this time to use it under a new username??
Complain about this comment
Chi Dafydd, clywch hyn:
You are a Nationalist while those who see through the Plaid Cymru Trojan Horse plan are Internationalists, who represent the vast majority of people in Wales (in fact even among the majority of Welsh first language speakers, I might add!!).
We look out to the world, not inward like you. We see the dangers of protectionism and linguistic chauvinism.
Why put up more barriers to communication and trade, when we need to reach out, build bridges and pull our economy back onto a recovery path?
Complain about this comment
#105
"....a Turkish or Chilean or Polish businessman speaks in English, ....He doesn't want to come to Wales and find he needs to incur the expense of hiring a Polish-Welsh translator to conduct business.
If so, he'll go to Scotland or Ireland....."
Perhaps you might do a bit of research before you make silly statements. The Irish Dail (Parliament) and the Scottish Parliament have the right to legislate on those countries' native languages.
Scots Gaelic in Scotland has suffered much the same fate as Welsh has in Wales, similarly the Irish language in Ireland. Most of the decline in their languages took place under English or British rule (Both terms apply here). Successive Irish governments have legislated to strengthen the language, and have been successful in many ways. In Scotland only about 2.9% of the population can speak Gaelic, yet the Scottish Parliament has plans to legislate to rejuvenate the language throughout the country.
You might care to read the following (particularly the contributions which the Members of ALL the parties, SNP, Labour, Conservative and LibDem, make in the first link):
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/sp/?id=2008-11-20.12694.0
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/nmcentre/news/news-08/pa08-041.htm
The Welsh Assembly is the only devolved body in the UK which does not have power to legislate on its own native language, that power is reserved to the UK Parliament in London. In itself, that is scandalous. No wonder the Language is in such a state.
The UK subscribes to the UN treaties on the rights of Minorities, and legislation on the Welsh Language is designed to meet some of the obligations on the protection of human rights of minorities. Its worth reading the following, particularly in relation to linguistic minorities:
http://www.fwdklerk.org.za/download_docs/01_08_Minority_Rights_Protection_Publ_PDF.pdf
(The blog won't accept the html link)
The UK is has also signed and ratified (that means its a legally binding commitment) the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. Most European countries (23 of them) have done so. The Council of Europe stresses the importance of minority languages as, 'an integral and essential part of Europe's mosaic'.
The Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Terry Davis, spoke up for regional and minority languages and not only defended their importance as part of our cultural heritage but also the fundamental right of speakers to use them “in private and public life.”
The Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Terry Davis, spoke up for regional and minority languages and not only defended their importance as part of our cultural heritage but also the fundamental right of speakers to use them 'in private and public life.'
Davis also talked about the stereotypes often associated with these languages: 'minorities are not an accident of history or an exotic and suspicious group of people, but an integral and essential part of Europe’s mosaic'. He added that 'we must not only tolerate a minority, we must respect it. The extent to which the majority protects and promotes the rights of the minority is a measure of the level of democratic development in a particular country.'
Complain about this comment
#109
The Irish, the French and the Dutch are internationalists; they are full members of the EU and the UN. Having self-determination does not of itself make a people inward-looking, its a status which most of the world's people already have.
The UK has held back from being a member of the Schengen Treaty, and has not joined the Eurozone. It is one of the most Eurosceptic members of the EU.. one foot in and one out, so to speak.
As I understand it, Plaid wants Wales to be a full member of the EU, without the current reservations which the UK has. It also wants Wales to have membership of the UN.
What is the meaning of 'linguistic chauvinism?'
WikiAnswers comes up with this, funnily enough...
"Linguistic chauvinism is the idea that one's language is superior to others. For a few examples, the Greeks called all non-Greek speakers barbarians, the French are only at home where French is spoken, and English speakers consider the ability to speak another language a social defect."
We are discussing the protection of minority linguistic rights, not linguistic chauvinism, which the above definition seems to imply is a characteristic of English speakers.
Complain about this comment
Until the Welsh Assembly has full parliamentry powers and authority, then this LCO strikes me as just right.... for now.
The fact that it upsets folks like Mapexx, Stonemason and Noahssembly means it is a good thing. I surmise they represent the most extream element of the Anti-Welsh coalition anyway- prehaps they are Conservitives? They have few seats in the Assembly anyway and with limited appeal.
I have full confidence that the Welsh language LCO is a good initial step in returning Language Rights from London to the Welsh people.
Complain about this comment
The Welsh Language LCO finishes with .....
"A full regulatory impact assessment has not been prepared for this Order as no impact on the private or voluntary sectors is foreseen."
.... no impact on the private or voluntary sectors is foreseen .....
Are the people who drafted this LCO witless, or do they think that the majority of people can be fooled.
Can someone please explain that "telecommunications services" are firmly in the private sector, they all have shareholders.
In addition ....... we are expected to ignore the following descriptions.
"telecommunications services" means any service that consists of providing access to, or facilities for making use of, any system which exists (whether wholly or partly in the United Kingdom or elsewhere) for the purpose of facilitating the transmission of communications by any means involving the use of electrical, magnetic or electro-magnetic energy (including the apparatus comprised in the system), but does not include broadcasting, radio, or television.
A crucial statement .....
"whether wholly or partly in the United Kingdom or elsewhere"
..... every mobile phone company doing business in Wales would be required to comply with the act, it also implies the mobile phone manufacturers in other countries will have to comply.
How soon before the box has a sticker that says "Not for resale in Wales".
The point of this comment is a reminder that the WAGocracy has not done its job properly ...... it admits that .....
"A full regulatory impact assessment has not been prepared for this Order"
"Naturally an impact assessment upon the British Constitution has not been considered either".
Complain about this comment
Re Brynt 41:
The legislative status quo on the Welsh language is more than adequate to comply with the opinions and values expressed by Terry Davis, Secretary General of the Council of Europe.
"the fundamental right of speakers to use them 'in private and public life.'"
Where are people prevented from speaking Welsh today? I know of no place.
So what is all this Welsh Language LCO about?
Previous contributors refer to "gravy train for Welsh Crachach elite" and linguistic nationalism and control freakery.
There are many other areas of social and economic policy where Wales could do with an LCO, and yet Plaid Cymru insist on this particular one.
We now see where their true allegiance lies. And it is not to the economic and social well-being of people living in Wales.
The LCO is a Nationalist Trojan Horse which will do serious harm to the long term interests of Wales, if it is ever put in the hands of the wrong people.
These are trying economic times for the Many, but the Few are only concerned about this piece of paper called LCO.
Hint: Lords of ........ Meirionnydd and Gwynedd and others!!!
Complain about this comment
Message 106...
Now there's a thought, myself and Shrek being one and the same.
Going on her obvious command of English, I would say far better than my own. She has yet to be taken down by many of the Cymraeg element, which is very apropo considering she was at one time a monoglot Cymraeg speaker.
Although I have a relatively decent level of both education and intellect, her messages are rather superior to mine, simply for the high degree of comprehension she demonstrates in her 'adopted' language.
MY messages are somewhat acerbic, due to the fact I believe in total openness in politics. Which I have to say does not exist in the matter of Welsh politics.
Dirty deals are done, between AM's and political parties, the outcome of which are the likes of the LCO on the language.
None of which has been placed before the public for scrutiny or for their acceptance.
As for Shrek, her excellent English leads me to say, my wife is also exceptionally good at the same subject, to at least the same level as Shrek, otherwise I would be seeking a divorce, and hunting down Shrek to do a bit of courting.
We would then, for certain, be one and the same, as our respective keyboards would be presenting our antipathy in stereo.
Complain about this comment
"And, LordBeddGelert, still no answer to my question, I see ..."
Which was, FiDafydd ?
Complain about this comment
106 puredrivelagain wrote:
Fi Dafydd,
Good spot on 101, sheer lunacy and blatant uneducated scare mongering. Typical Unionist rhetoric.
I'd ignore Shrek-Girl if I were you, from the style of writing and sporadic of CAPITALS in her sentences, she sounds EXACTLY like Mapexx. Wouldn't surprise me if they were the same person."
Re: 115.mapexx wrote:
Message 106...
"Now there's a thought, myself and Shrek being one and the same."
Complain about this comment
# 95, 96 Stonemason -
Thanks very much for the directions. I'll go and have a look. I agree with you that it's odd that a link isn't allowed here (especially since one wasn't given with Betsan Powys' original post).
Perhaps we could discuss the contents, then, and try to work out what's what.
#97, 98 Shrek-Girl
May I repeat my request that you speak rationally so that I can engage with you on an intelligent level? A peidiwch, pli^s, a^ phregethu imi am sefyllfa'r Cymry Cymra^g. (translation.: "please don't lecture me on the situation of the Welsh-speakers").
My questions to you, Shrek-Girl, are (repeating the one you haven't yet answered):
i) what is so terrible about Gwynedd (would you address my point also about your negativity in being so upset at there being a small part of the world left where Welsh might be strong)? [See point below, also, about Gwynedd]
ii) What is this 'trojan horse'? What is so bad about this LCO beyond it bringing legislative powers into the control of a democratically-elected body in Wales? Trojan horse is rather a negative way to describe democracy. You talk about the dangers of power being put in the "hands of the wrong people" but isn't that a danger with any political system, and the reason why there are checks and balances in place on national and international levels to ensure fair representation?
iii) you claim (#114) that Welsh-speakers are never prevented from speaking Welsh. Are you sure? How many Physics degrees have recently been taken in Welsh? (And on the other end of the scale, don't you think the Thomas Cook fiasco is exemplary?).
I remember once watching one of Wales' foremost poets and musicians trying to get access to a nightclub in Caernarfon when he was on the guestlist (he was performing that evening) and the bouncer physically refused to allow him entry until it was explained to him in the language of *the bouncer's* choice what was going on.
The Welsh musician was prevented (physically) from speaking Welsh... and in Caernarfon, where you claim it is English-speaker who are discriminated against. If I want, when I'm at home, to talk to my local police (and I live in a 'Welsh-speaking' area of Wales, that is often impossible in any language other than English.
Many aspects of life are near impossible in Welsh, in *all* parts of Wales. It's likely that this LCO won't fix all that (the reasons are more complex than simply extending the scope of the Language Act to the private sphere), and in fact it's likely that these points are often red herrings in the debate about the LCO, but they are nonetheless important and it would be good to try to clear them up... reasonably.
Thanks, Shrek-Girl, for your consideration of these points.
Complain about this comment
#113 Stonemason
A serious and respectful question for you.
Have you travelled much in Europe, where the borders between countries are often easily crossed for purposes of trade and travel? (Where the borders have often been redrawn for various other purposes).
Have you noticed how the packaging for most objects sold is labelled in a number of languages (up to four, five, seven or more in some cases, with the language groups differing from region to region, depending, I suspect, on distribution networks)?
This is seen often even in Britain, where side-by-side with English (in instruction manuals and even on the packaging itself) we see German, French, Italian, Polish, etc. Here in the USA Spanish is of course commonly seen.
Are you serious in suggesting that the addition of Welsh would cause such a major inhibition to trade?
You ask "How soon before the box has a sticker that says "Not for resale in Wales"."
My question is - what makes the Welsh language so different from all other European languages that this step would be impossible.
If we think in a European (rather than a "monoglot" British) context, don't many of these problems vanish?
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr re 90
You ask
[West Wales, you show us the way forward]
Ok my view!!
Brynt41 at 89 and while we disagree on a fundamental level, has this to say.
[I agree, two wrongs don't make a right. Policies on the Welsh Language should be implemented with sensitivity, and I'm sure they will be. There many vested interests which will ensure that they are. The difference between us is that you can only see things from your point of view. In any case, the problems you refer to are nothing to do with the LCO application, but with existing legislation passed by Westminster.]
I don't share his desire for independence nor do I agree with his comment that I only see things from my own point of view.
But I agree two wrongs do not make a right, Policies on the Welsh Language should be implemented with sensitivity, and that the existing legislation was passed by Westminster.
However he will probably disagree with me if I suggest that the root of much of our current problems stem from that legislation, and the activities of the WLB.
But the proposed Language LCO legal framework is based on the 1993 Act and will only cause more trouble and argument.
I've made the point many times that I don't think the current legislative approach is either working or is a workable way forward.
Those advocating more legislation must decide what they want;
To make Wales a great country worth living in, providing a home and future for our children, to rebuild and strengthen our heritage's, cultures and language.
Or
Use the Language as a political weapon and means of achieving political change.
If the later I cannot help and will oppose you.
If the former then we are in business, there is a real debate to be had.
I would start that debate by pointing to the millions (perhaps Billions) of pounds spent annually on bureaurocracy, enforcing, monitoring and policing to ensure everyone is adhering to the Legislative measure already in place that is achieving little.
The WLB is a monster parasite growing exponentially and controlling all of us.
Then add in the vast expenditure on fulfilling that legislation, unnecessary jobs, duplication of every bit of information, forcing councils to spend unnecessary things.
To see the full picture go to the WLB website and scroll through the range of things they have their fingers in. - Look at the masses of procedures and requirements. The associated tangles of red tape.
Is this monster really delivering for the people of Wales.
OK there is a kings ransom to be released, enormous amounts of human ability and ingenuity.
Brynt41 and others are constantly harping on about how deprived Wales is.
I knock the Assembly for not delivering infrastructure, wasting money on projects that produce little or no benefits, social of economic.
There is also the most important job of education rebuilding, and celebrating the language and preserving our great diverse cultural heritage.
I obviously have my own ideas.
But this is where the debate should begin.
We should be building not destroying - we should be reducing costs, bureaucracy, and legislation - we need to free the people of Wales not chain them.
We should be improving our quality of life not squabbling and squandering our resources or dividing our people.
We should be pulling together not setting Welshman against Welshman.
But it is the Welsh people who must choose - not small sectional groups of activists.
That way is a recipe for trouble.
So forget the AWC yes no referendum, that is simply a political fix to justify more of the same - lets put the thing to bed for ever ask the questions the people of Wales want to answer.
Complain about this comment
Re 116
LordBeddGelert,
It seems an age ago now! But it's a simple question. Can you name any parliament or government in the world that only deals with one matter or one piece of legislation at a time, even at times of economic woe? This seemed to be something that bothered you in relation to this LCO.Thank you!
And, Bostoniwr, please don't waste your time asking Shrek-Girl questions; she won't answer. She's not there!
Complain about this comment
*105 Shrek Girl
"World leaders now the dangers of protectionism when we are in a global recession. "
Interestingly, yes, they know the dangers of protectoinism *in other economies* as by definition, it excludes them from partaking in that economy.
Look at American rules governing agriculture or the steel industry (just as examples), and you will understand the importance of protectionism, even to the one of the most pro-free-market economy in the world.
But I to am fascinated by the references to the Kingdom of Gwynedd, as I spend quite a bit of time there. Really, what's so bad? Do tell!
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr, your #119.
I have travelled, I concur with everything you wrote in #119.
It's not the language, it is the politics.
Personally, I would say make everything equal, but please don't ask for the legal cudgel, because that tells me there is something hidden, something for the future that is not told, it smacks of brutality, and there is enough of that in the world.
Just as Henry VIII took away, so the 21st century can return.
Complain about this comment
As a Welsh speaker, first language, I'm finding this whole thing a big embarrassment. I bet the English are having a right good laugh at us. Again.
My language, that I love so much, has now been reduced to a political tool. It's going to increase resentment towards Welsh, not just in Wales. In fact, it might even turn Welsh speaker off their own language.
Also, if this all goes ahead, there's pressure on us Welsh speakers to justify the use of the language in businesses.
The Welsh language has enough equality at the moment. This is going too far. It finally felt like the whole situation was calming down and then this happens. If they want to promote Welsh, they should concentrate on the appalling way that Welsh is taught in English medium education.
Not all Welsh speakers want this.
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr (118) and Just1nD (122) - see other thread (And finally....) for my reply.
Complain about this comment
Sorry I meant: Fire alarms.....
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr (118):
"Many aspects of life are near impossible in Welsh, in *all* parts of Wales"
If you expect us to believe that, then you really are deluded.
There must be an infinitesimally small percentage of people in Wales who go around insisting that everything they touch has to respond in Welsh, everyone they meet must speak in Welsh etc.
This is absolute nonsense, and has no place in a modern, 21 st century setting.
Most ordinary folk just want to get about their business in life and look out for their families as best they can in these difficult times.
You are in some dream land, not the real world!
Complain about this comment
Message 124....
Careful mechanic, you'll be labeled, anti Welsh, anti Wales etc etc. Next they'll be saying you are part of a tripartate,
....Mappexx, Shrek, Mechanic....
Just one of the slimy Plaid designed insults thrown at folk who go against their cosy little elitist plans.
Go for it man, tell them how it is, I wager there are lots more like you who are heartily sick to the teeth with all this crap about the language and the invisible culture.
Complain about this comment
mapexx
What do you mean by 'invisible' culture'? Eisteddfod? S4C? Welsh language bands? Poetry? Books? Songs? I'm not trying to pick a fight, just asking. Or do you mean something else?
I am sick of my language being used as a political tool. Everything was going well, and now this has just increased animosity towards Welsh. If you want to promote Welsh, concentrate on children's education, they are our future and will decide the fate of the language.
So in trying to promote the language, it's done the opposite! Well done!
Complain about this comment
#125 Shrek-Girl
I can't find the response you mention. I find other comments by you, but nothing which addresses my questions.
Complain about this comment
re: 127 Shrek-Girl
*sigh* Wrong again! lol.
Posted from the Power of Language:
Many of of the current companies that do supply Welsh language services give incomplet or sub-standard customer service in Welsh (even automated services), making use of those services difficult at best. I have worked in customer service, and if one can not speak with authority regarding specific items of business, you lose the trust of the customer. If Welsh language services can not relate the same sense of authority to their patrons in the Welsh language, then customers will use the other service.
Additionally, "The Welsh Language society's campaign officer Sioned Haf said: "Very often these companies have only one Welsh speaker in their offices to answer your call.
"If that person is away, or does not have a speciality in your field of enquiry, then you do not have a viable Welsh language service."
However, you are likely to miss a very important statement in that Welsh Water recorded a 50 percent increase in its Welsh language based services following an advertising campaign. If other companies did simular ad campaigns, or were compelled to, I am sure there would be simular results.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7218906.stm
Contrast this with the artical of the supermarket Tesco adding Welsh language automated services at self check out lines, responding to local demands for more services in Welsh.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7636177.stm
"Felix Gummer, the Tesco's corporate affairs manager for Wales said the change allowed the supermarket to "serve communities in the best possible way".
"In response to customer demand and multilingualism in Wales all our new stores signs have been fully bilingual for some time, but today is a further step forward as we have listened to the views of customers for more services to be in Welsh."
This reflects findings in Carmarthenshire in a study commissioned by Education and Learning Wales. According to Dr Lowri Lloyd from Trinity College, "The research did prove that employers do see the value of the Welsh language with 80.5% reporting financial benefit as a result of providing bilingual services.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/2088726.stm
"The research found that Welsh language is valued by the public.
"But if a bilingual service was not apparent, then the public were not confident enough to request it," added Dr Lloyd.
Dr Lloyd's comments ring true for all business models.
Complain about this comment
Message 129....
As seen from the Anglo/Welsh side we detect no culture that stands up to scrutiny.
es there bare occasional gatherings where the langauge is used, but in truth they are modern emplacements.
Yes ther is poetry and song, music and drama, yes there is S4C, but they are ALL ouitwards demonstrations of the USE of the language in a correct context.
NO one is saying otherwise, but what is being said is the way the language is being promoted, makes the value of those aspects of 'culture' worthless, as far more people in Wales, including many who are either bilingual, or prefer to communicate in Cymraeg, contribute more to the 'normal' British culture, for what it's worth, than to the Cymraeg culture.
Take S4C for example, it has been estimated that each viewer of that channel actually costs the taxpayer, something in the order of £3k.
Or to put it another way, the number who actually turn to that channel rise quite dramatically when the likes of Pobl Y Cwm is on, but fall to almost zero for much of the rest of the time. Except for sport, where it has been found most viewers turn down the sound and raise the radio volume on BBC Wales.
You have complained that the current methods being used by some, are turning people away from the language, that is a sad state of affairs, but what can you expect when all we are getting is more and more from Cardiff Bay, forcing issues we have never given them a properly sought mandate to engage in ,never mind to use such pressures, as they are using.
If you carefully read what has been said by many who are against further powers for the Bay, you will find no antipathy towards the language, invariably you will find it supported, but by means of general acceptance, not by legislated for powers that will enforce the language where it is not wanted, has no general use, and is resented by children and parents alike.
Complain about this comment
message 131....
"But if a bilingual service was not apparent, then the public were not confident enough to request it"
I suggest Dr Lloyd was in error, it was far more than likely that the public were ...
....NOT INTERESTED!.
The' ring of truth' is more like' the ring of confidence' used by Colgate some years ago, to flog their tooth enamel abrasive, but far more sinister when coupled to the motivations of the Assembly, and all who sail in it, and with it.
From recent comments by certain business leaders, I detect a degree of reluctant acceptance of something already seen as done and dusted.
What do they know, that we do not?
Complain about this comment
"normal" British culture eh Mapexx - like Welsh (sorry Cymraeg) culture is abnormal? I honestly don't think it's deliberate but you can be extremely insulting you know.
Complain about this comment
So, if a company like Tesco has already bent over backwards on these things under existing laws, why do we need more legislation in the form of this LCO?
Is there no end to this madness?
Complain about this comment
re: 133
I'd much rather trust sourced information by accredited journalists then your rants here, lol. What rings true are that these sources cover a span of years, and is the business community responding to a academic study.
I am sure the readership appreciates souced information and facts to bluster and hot air.
Complain about this comment
Message 134,....
I suppose I can be,. but why is it you people are so swift to rise, so rapid to see insult where none is placed, or certainly not intended.
I do try to tell it as I see it.
To clarify my use of remarks on the 'culture',...
The expression referred to the British everyday 'culture' you can see all around you., In every shop, school, street, on TV, in the Cinema ....well.. just about everywhere
There was no implication that what YOU may see as Cymraeg culture is not normal, or abnormal,... just different.
That said, there is little evidence of any Cymraeg based culture in any of those venues I have mentioned.
There is however, a massive difference between what we consider normal, and what you consider normal, it's called NUMBERS involved.
Even amongst those who profess to speak only Cymraeg in their everyday communications, there is a large take up of what we call British culture.
Other wise, the numbers tuning in to S4C and Radio Cymru would be far higher than they are. That is a fact that cannot be disputed. Unless of course, those speakers of Cymraeg who do not normally tune in to Radio Cymru or S4C, have no radio or TV.
I must allow for that eventuality, must I not?
The recent remarks by someone stating the viewing and listening figures were rising, maybe so, but they hardly impact on the declared numbers who speak Cymraeg.
The viewing and listening figures provided by Audience research shows marked consistent low viewing figures compared to the total who are supposed to be the core viewers of those broadcasting stations.
Maybe the same applies to the potential take up of Cymraeg language newpspers and magazines, hence there being none, as they could not drum up the advertising or reader funding to even get up and running.
To sum up, I would suggest that, if asked to opt for the British 'culture' or the Cymraeg 'culture. even the Cymraeg fluents would be hard put to opt for the Cymraeg, as there is not enough in it to satisfy their needs, on a day to day basis.
Enforcing the language through legislative process will do more damage to your base support, that you realise, once THEY realise what they are, in consequence, very likely to lose.
Complain about this comment
Re 135
Tesco with THEIR profits having bent over backwards??!! You must be joking.
What am I doing? I'm replying to somebody who doesn't exist!!!
Complain about this comment
message 136....
But that is not where you are at, is it?
Dr Lloyd was the source according to you. or did I read it wrong.
Dr Lloyd therefore is expressing an opinion based on what?
Because most in Wales do not adhere to the way the Bay would wish them to, they are showing 'a lack of confidence?'
Get real... the vast bulk of our population don't care one whit about the language, the Bay, the Assembly, a ridiculous excuse for a government, or the nationalist bullshit we are being swamped under.
Sourced info is one thing, quotations from someone, who obviously cannot read the runes, is something entirely different.
Complain about this comment
Mapexx-
'normal' British culture? I think you should have worded that a bit better mate! But I think i know what you mean. By 'normal' do you mean the British media and music etc? Rather that S4C? Like, Duffy sings in English and not Welsh?
And I would argue that Welsh culture (not just Welsh language culture) is a lot more tangible than 'British culture'. What's sad is that there are Welsh societies in America, Japan who study our culture and language yet even people in our own country don't want anything to do with it, or don't value it.
Forget the fact that the WAG are involved:
http://www.wai.org.uk/index.cfm?UUID=AB12789B-65BF-7E43-39310255F69274D4
I also do not like this 'has no general use' business. Many argue that they would prefer their children were taught a 'useful' language such as French or German in school as a second language, instead of Welsh. Right, I did French GCSE, and I can honestly say it has been of no use whatsoever to me! But I use Welsh every day.
Also with this issue of kids being 'forced' to learn Welsh as a second language in school. Kids will always hate certain lessons. There were so many subjects I hated in school, and I can't remember a single thing I learned. Education is about giving children opportunities and choices. If they don't want to learn Welsh after GCSE level then fine, but at least they were given the chance. I know many people who, after being taught Welsh as a second language in school, went on to adult learning classes, or a degree.
Anyway, I can't wait til this whole thing has blown over.
Complain about this comment
137. mapexx wrote:
"I suppose I can be,. but why is it you people are so swift to rise, so rapid to see insult where none is placed, or certainly not intended."
If you wish to be given the benifit of the doubt, then stop using terms like Cymreag cuture, and "you people". Think about what you write before writting it.
When you use the word Cymraeg it comes across as raciest, thus offensive.
The "British Culture" you write about is in truth part of a wider Western Pop-culture, and everyone in the West shares as part of that. Pop culture of corse is "Popular Culture," so named because it appeals to the widest segment of the Western world.
Pop culture transends language, and is interpeted by local cultures adding their own local twists to it.
Welsh culture too shares in this, and the Welsh language does not live in a vacuum, rather is influenced by the wider Western Culture in general.
Complain about this comment
And still no answer from LordBeddGelert in the Kingdom of Gwynedd ...
Complain about this comment
message 136....
"Dr Lloyd was the source according to you. or did I read it wrong."
Yes, you did read it wrong
Dr Lowri Lloyd from Trinity College, Carmarthen, was the professor overseeing the study interviewed by the BBC.
She was revealing her results in an interview on her study funded by Trinity Collage.
Mapexx wrote:
"Get real... the vast bulk of our population don't care one whit about the language, the Bay, the Assembly, a ridiculous excuse for a government, or the nationalist bullshit we are being swamped under."
Clearly you are without redemption. *sigh*
Complain about this comment
We don't need this LCO, we are free to speak Welsh already if we wish to do so. This is just a Plaid Cymru Nationalist Trojan Horse to grab the reins of media communication control over the whole of Wales. And then.......
will the last person to leave switch off the lights......?
Complain about this comment
Mechanicaltattoo...
you speak a lot of sense but the only way this issue is going to go away and 'blow over' is if english and welsh speakers unite to get rid of this extremist element that is exploiting your (and mine as it apparently belongs to all the people of Wales... thats funny cos it doesnt feel like it!) language for political gain.
I am truely thankful for your existence as you prove (as I've always known) that it is only a tiny minority that constantly wish to force this issue. The average welsh speaker in Ceredigion or wherever is more interested in the economy and the job market just like the rest of us.
However, you do surprise me on one count because I'd never have expected to find a person such as yourself posting here... I thought it was purely the reserve of rabid nationalists and people like myself who make a hobby out of engaging in their crazed discussions :)
Complain about this comment
Shrek Girl
"We don't need this LCO, we are free to speak Welsh already if we wish to do so."
Yes...although you'd love it if we weren't, if your comments regarding Gwynedd and its people are anything to go by!
Complain about this comment
Mechanical tattoo
Could I be cheeky enough to ask you a question which you may take the wrong way? (I really mean no offence, but you may still be offended. If so, sorry before I start!)
You say that you wish the whole LCO business hadn't arisen, because it has caused so much bitter comment and division. Fair comment.
Had the bitter comment and division not arisen, would you support the principle behind the LCO (that of English and Welsh being given equal status.)? And if so, if the bitterness has swayed your opinion aginst the LCO, is it possible that you have been 'bullied' into not supporting something that you would otherwise have done?
I ask, because when I was one of 'Maggie's Millions', I made the mistake of asking for the Welsh language form for claiming the dole (I knew they were available, and thought that I might as well ask...). I was subjected to a 10 minute lecture on how I was no more Welsh than the woman I was talking to, and given both metaphorical barrels about the Welsh language and the Nationalists who speak it. It was a while before I put myself in that situation again, and I suspect that the memory still prevents me from taking up my rights to my language in some situations.
Complain about this comment
Re 144
I suppose Shrek-Girl could be a machine ...
Complain about this comment
*144
I know that the assembly has been accused of incompetence on these pages, but to include a specific exclusion of the media in an LCO designed to give them control over the media would, I think, convince the most ardent assembly supporter to think again.
Complain about this comment
Why have the Welsh Assembly not polled the people who will actually be affected by this damn stupid idea to FORCE Welsh down our throats? I resent the time my child has to spend in the class learning Welsh, fat lot of good that will be to her. Across the boarder her peers are learning French or German, languages that will actually be of USE. In fact when I last rang her school, I had to wait while the secretary answered the phone with the greeting in English anad Welsh. When I enquired what would happen should the person on the other end of the phone continued the call in Welsh, her answer was that she would be stumped, as her mastery of the language went as far as the greeting she had to learn. So is the fact for 90% of people who do this type of work. Then the expense of printing 2 sets of every letter tht comes through the door, 1 English, 1 Welsh. Where soes the Welsh version go? Yep, in the bin. Then there is the enviormental queston, extra paper used to print off these extra copies, more in, MASSIVE CARBON FOOT PRINT. Get real. The welsh language is being FORCED upon us by a hand full of zealots who like the sound of their own voices. It is UNWANTED, UNPOPULAR. Me? well as soon as finaces/the econamy allows, my house will be on the market, and I and my family will heading across the boarder to England, for the sake of my childs education, if not for my sanity.
Complain about this comment
Mapexx. You say that there is no Welsh culture (at least none that "you" (pl.) have vetted). Here's the quote:
"As seen from the Anglo/Welsh side we detect no culture that stands up to scrutiny."
I would like to ask you to clarify this statement since you frequently claim that Welsh culture is invisible. How, then, have you found it in order to subject it to scrutiny?
I was going to ask you, since you propose that from your own point of view nothing offered on these discussion threads as culture (literature, cinema, poetry, drama, folk music, rock music, opera, intellectual discussion, jokes down the pub) is 'real culture' - I was going to ask you how you would define 'culture'. I'm still interested in this, and I'll come back to it in a minute.
An underlying paradox in your position is that you in fact allow no culture to Wales at all, Anglo-Welsh or Welsh. We are all subsumed in a homogeneous 'Britishness'. Here's the quote:
"To clarify my use of remarks on the 'culture',... The expression referred to the British everyday 'culture' you can see all around you., In every shop, school, street, on TV, in the Cinema ....well.. just about everywhere"
So not only, according to you, is there no Welsh-language culture in Wales, there's no Welsh culture at all. Nothing distinguishes Wales from the whole of Britain. I would suspect that on any definition you could offer, nothing would differentiate Britain from Ireland, France or America (or anywhere with shops, schools, streets and TVs). This doesn't seem like a particularly useful approach to 'culture'.
(I note that here you don't tell us what this culture is, merely where we can find it - clarification would be good, lest I start believing you, and calling myself an Eskimo).
To summarise:
i) what description of Welsh culture (English- or Welsh-language) would qualify as 'culture' in your eyes?
ii) are you sure there's no culture in Wales apart from 'British' (i.e. nothing different from England, Scotland, Northern Ireland)? Please clarify.
Complain about this comment
Message 140....
Yes Iam aware there are Welsh societies, clubs etc overseas, but that does not mean they bare any miore cultural than what we have here.
The usual term used is Hiraeth, roughly translated to English as Nostalgia.
This can become exceptionally mind bending when away from home territory, the feelings can then be transferred, with high levels of emphais. almost to a point of indoctrination, into those surrounding you.
But no matter how you look at it, the paucity of 'culture' within Wales itself itself evident by it's perceived absence.
I do not doubt that itCAN be discovered, usually whenever a gaggle of Cymraeg speakers get together, but to the overwhelming majority it is conspicuous by it's total absence at any other time.
I assume you do know the meaning of the word you used 'tangible' which can be said another way 'touchable'.
That is where you and I must part our ways, there is nothing tangible to the mass of our population, apart from road signs.
Message 136....
You still want the penny and the bun!
You stated that you would rather trust information from accredited sources, specifically .....
"I'd much rather trust sourced information by accredited journalists ...."
Somewhat different than saying that Dr Lloyd said it.
Which way will you turn next?
But even then it does not make her comments correct. I still say, whether you like it or not, that it is not lack of confidence, (which is a stupid remark ..we ARE talking about the Welsh are we not, ...have you ever met a non-confident Welsh person?)
We are talking INDIFFERENCE, by the vast majority...big time.
Then you made the statement..
"Yes you did read it wrong"
.... the question I asked was ..
Was Dr Lloyd the source?
...you then immediately responded to your own remark by saying the source was Dr Lloyd.. not a journalist after all then?
Make your mind up.
Complain about this comment
Re 150
Fantastic English grammar Emsmerald!!!
Complain about this comment
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
FiDafydd,
When enraged ......
Insult ..... Emsmerald ..... in this case.
The Nationalist way.
Complain about this comment
Re 153\
[Fantastic English grammar Emsmerald!!!]
This is a Blog FiDafydd - you dump words and ideas in a rush- spelling and grammar come second - its getting the message over that counts.
You can pick holes in almost anyones posts.
Especially mine.
But
Coming from someone who didn't even know what difference a "S"or "Z" made in a word.
Pot & Kettle come to mind.
But at least we all know what she is saying!
Complain about this comment
Mapexx
I repeat my questions to you at my #151.
I further refer to your #152 where you say, "the paucity of 'culture' within Wales itself itself evident by it's perceived absence."
I remind you that every time you have been presented with examples of Welsh culture you have said words to the effect of "crap", "not interested".
I suggest that there is no absence (though I wait your clarifications re my #151) but rather that you are simply betraying the classic, centuries-old imperialistic attitude of "their primitive culture is not worth bothering with". This attitude led to the decimation of native cultures almost everywhere the Europeans set foot, and you and ShrekGirl (as well as those famous Daily Mail readers) are continuing this agenda.
Please correct me if I am wrong - I refer you again (such repetition is tiring but unfortunately it is often necessary: one feels with you and ShrekGirl like Paxman interviewing Boris Johnson) to my #151.
Complain about this comment
#150 Emsmerald
Your voice (and the repetition in it of stock phrases) rings bells.
It would be most useful to see the IP addresses behind this 'plurality' of new contributors (Emsmerald, I notice, hasn't contributed anything else to the BBC's blogs in the past week, and yet comes on the scene - much like ShrekGirl - worked up into a terrible tizz).
It might be worth bearing in mind, "Emsmerald" et al.* that repeating lies and fostering propaganda doesn't make these lies true.
*though in this case the 'alia' might be more of an 'idem'.
Complain about this comment
mapexx- Hiraeth means 'intense longing' or homesickness. Not nostalgia. It's a beautiful word, please don't misuse it! I'm sorry, but I can't agree with you about culture. I see no point in explaining it to you, because I have a feeling we'll still disagree.
Justin1nD-
No, it's not offensive!
No, I wouldn't have supported it. I think it's pointless. It could drive businesses away from Wales.
The whole point of preserving the Welsh language (in my view) is that it's there for Welsh people if they want to learn it. 'Iaith Pawb'- 'Everybody's Language'
I know what you mean. I've had people call me a snob, and that I think I'm better than everyone else because I speak Welsh. It's not my fault I was born into a Welsh speaking family who put me through a Welsh education. But it's not non-Welsh speakers fault they can't speak it either.
I've had people say things about Welsh right to my face, just because I was speaking it to a friend. And the only way I could deal with it, was by building up an arrogance, as a defense. I've mellowed out loads now, as people are more accepting. But snobbery works both ways.
I would never normally post on these sort of things, but I feel like Welsh speakers are being badly misrepresented. Not all Welsh speakers are raving nationalists. And not all non-Welsh speakers are, well, the opposite of nationalists.
Emsmerald- Welsh is not that unpopular. I have many friends my age (25) who wish they were given the opportunity to have a Welsh education. Or are thinking of taking up Welsh classes. There were many lessons in school I found pointless and I thought they were a waste of time. Education is about giving kids chances, to figure out for themselves what they want to do with their lives. I hated geography, and I can't remember a single thing I learned. But maybe someone else from my class went onto do a geography degree. I know people who took Welsh as a second language in school, and went onto to degrees in Welsh or onto further adult classes. Kids will always hate something about school! That's life! And I took French as a second language, got an A, and I haven't used it once since leaving school. Welsh, can be used every day in Wales.
I guess I'll be accused of being a nationalist now.
Complain about this comment
"You people"
"A gaggle of Welsh speakers"
Enough - if those observations were directed toward another ethnic group they would be moderated. Mapexx is beyond civility.
Complain about this comment
Good evening FiDafydd.
Proud of yourself are you, posting pompous nonsense like this. . .
153. At 6:29pm on 04 Feb 2009, FiDafydd wrote:
Re 150
Fantastic English grammar Emsmerald!!!
***********************************
I strongly suspect that if Emsmerald belonged to your little group, you would never have commented.
I've come across a few like you on forums/blogs, who delight in attempting to make others look small by pointing out any grammar/punctuation errors they may make.
However there is a snag though FiDafydd. From now on I, (and I suspect others) will now be watching your (uninspiring) offerings like a hawk. Any errors you make. . . .and there will be errors, will be pointed out to you in no uncertain manner.
What's sauce for the goose eh! FiDafydd.
Complain about this comment
Message 151, and it's continuing whinge....
I said ...'none that can be scrutinised'..., that means there is NONE that can be found in everyday life ANYWHERE in Wales. It does not imply there is one.
If one has the time to spare, one can no doubt find traces of it somewhere tucked away on a special shelf in WH Smith or more likely in some small out of the way bookshop down an alley in some town or other, but out in the open? NO way.
This is the problem with utilising the language to try to stamp your seal on whatever it is you term 'Culture'.
Whatever there may be is swamped by the 'culture' that, Yes, the whole western world is steeped in.
I do not have to explain, by dissection what is involved in that culture, for the simple reason it is there, staring you in the face every time you turn on your TV, or read a newspaper, or in general terms whenever you exit your front door.
The culmination end result of some couple of thousand years of evolving social and and scientific advancement.
Even now, this very second, it is still evolving, that is why we are against the stultifying effects likely to come from this LCO you people are so enamoured of.
I have not the slightest doubt it can be found in truck loads in Academic venues, but there it is not readily available to be accessed by the general public, especially the Anglo Welsh, who, as I have told you many times, before show a remarkable lack of interest in it.
Yes, you can mention the poetry and music nights in the local pub, you can also mention the fact there is a radio station and a TV station dedicated to the language, but not even the bulk of the Cymraeg speaking Cymro can manage to raise much enthusiasm for either, the viewing and listening figures prove that.
I cannot recall who asked but I will now give an answer I wished to give earlier, so I am sure it will be picked up by the person concerned..
I specify Cymraeg and Cymru, and Cymro, for the simple reason that is the titles Wales, the language, and the man, call themselves in reference to their options and preferences.
If it is therefore seen as an insult, then I am very sorry for you.
I would be quite happy if you referred to me as Saes, because in the language of your choice I know that is what you call me, even though I am Welsh.
If you also referred to England as Lloeger, that is also acceptable, in fact I would deem it somewhat complimentary to that state.
But... whatever turns you on, so clear the idea out of your head I am insulting you, I am in fact giving you the titles you seem to be demanding, at every turn of the page.
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr.
Or should that be Jeremy Paxman, or Inquisitor general!
Your arrogance knows no bounds. YOU are the one so besotted with Welsh culture, I (like Mapexx), know damn well it just doesn't exist. YOU prove it does!!!! I bet you cannot even define 'culture' never mind so called 'Welsh culture', may I suggest BINGO in Welsh !!!
Oh sure we have the jaw-dropping clog and broom dancing, guaranteed to have an audience yawning and reaching for the aspirins. Also the appalling Dafydd Iwan, who has spent his life feeding on nasty, negative, nationalist ditties which have been known to stir up the younger, rather impressionable element.
That, Bostoniwr is just about it regarding the myth of Welsh culure. Only a fool or a bigot would even suggest that language has anything whatsoever to do with things. Though once again you are clutching at straws.
Of couse we appreciate that you are compelled to create some cultural, nationalist identity when none exists. But quite frankly you are wasting your and everybody else's time.
Complain about this comment
cardiffian2008-
I don't know what can be done. I really feel like writing them a letter or something and tell them to leave the language alone. Extremists always spoil it for the rest of us. It's not about the language for them, it's power. And you only have to look at the Daily Mail site to see what it's done for Wales. It's made look like a bunch of idiots, again, just when people were starting to think we were ok (I think!)
And you'll never know how much guilt I feel when people say 'Welsh doesn't feel like my language'. I feel extremely guilty that I'm able to speak it and others can't. I'm sure that if I wasn't able to speak Welsh, I'd feel like I was being left out and feel frustrated and angry.
This is such a sad situation. 'Cymru' means land of compatriots. And it really doesn't feel that way at the moment.
Complain about this comment
Message 164....
Mechy old chum, believe me, and I am sure I speak for quite a few who are constantly accused of antipathy towards Wales and the language you hold dear, I certainly sympathise with your current feelings re the power mad lunatics who are attempting to grab Wales for themselves, and abusing the language, by using it as a weapon in furthering their endeavours.
We are well aware that a large number, (probably the majority if truth was out) who daily use the language in their communities, possibly feel as you do, They too are embarrassed and ashamed that their language is being used as a political weapon, and I live in hopes, not only for myself and like minded folk, that once the people wake up to the agenda all this stuff is following, they will throw the lot out, lock stock, and Senedd.
They will return the language, untrammelled by such a political albatross as the Assembly/WAG, back to where it truly belongs, in the heads and hearts of it's true home, the people to who it belongs before it was hijacked by this bunch of latter day charlatans, posing as being there for your and my benefit, when we are all coming to realise just why they are there and what they are really after.
Complain about this comment
Re 155, 161
It always makes me laugh when the British Nationalists on here - those whose only objective is to insult those who dare disagree with them - display some sham anger when one of their number is 'insulted' in some way.
The only point of Emsmerald's contribution was to rubbish the idea of a Welsh language education. I found it ironic that the point was made in such bad English - but, as has been made clear to us, many times, on 'this side' of the argument, we are a humourless lot.
I'm not quite sure by now what exactly we can do as far as debating is concerned. Questions remain unanswered. Corrections ignored. Debate shunned. The StoneMason is far too superior for us poor Welshies; mapexx inhabits his own parallel orbit; LordBeddGelert refuses or is unable to answer questions; NoahAssembly has recently confessed that he is only here to insult and annoy (and now , it seems, to get annoyed!), and of course Shrek-Girl doesn't even exist. British nationalism is indeed safe and sound in these people's hands ...
Complain about this comment
Re 165
You nearly had me in tears mappy!
Complain about this comment
The language zealots are indeed a huge embarrassment to Welsh speaking Welsh people.
They unwittingly (or perhaps not..) create division and by behind-the-scenes bullying work towards their goal of Welsh First Wales, that is the true purpose of "a truly billingual Wales" called for by King Fred of Gwynedd, ably supported by his Court Jester brother and other very notable Nationalista Crachach.
Complain about this comment
mapexx-
Ok, glad we agree on that one. I just wish things had been left as they were. What needs to happen is a survey or even invite the public to go to the Assembly to have a meeting about it. Because all that's being heard, is anti- Welsh rantings, and nationalist rantings. There's no in-between. That's why I decided to post on here, as I didn't feel my views were being represented.
But I still have no idea about this 'invisible culture' thing. I've read your posts over and over, and to be honest, I still don't understand what you mean. It's not that I don't agree, I can't understand what you're trying to say. The way you are wording your answers make no sense! Can you make bullet points or something? You seem to be ignoring quite direct questions, by FiDafydd. They are even in point form. Please do the same.
The way I see it, is that if the Welsh language didn't exist, all the poems, songs etc that I value so much wouldn't exist. Welsh culture does exist today. It affects the way we think, our humour, our values, the way we talk. Yes, Britain as a whole does share a lot of the same culture, that's to be expected. But Scotland has it's own culture. Their humour is different, the way they talk is different, they have their own poets, songs. Socts and Scots Gaelic does still play a part in their lives.
Complain about this comment
re: 168. Shrek-Girl wrote:
"The language zealots are indeed a huge embarrassment to Welsh speaking Welsh people."
Take that to the people who voted Plaid in this last election! Indeed, Plaid's appeal transends just the matter of language, as many non-Welsh speakers voted them in Carmarthen, Cardigan, and in South Wales!
I pointed that out to you when you tried to peg Plaid to Gwynedd only, if you remember.
Complain about this comment
mapexx-
Sorry, I meant questions from Bostoniwr, not FiDafydd.
Complain about this comment
I've been highly amused by some of the comments I've read here. But I think I can put things into a much better perspective by quoting from the debate in the Assembly after the LCO statement was made. You can read in full here:
http://www.assemblywales.org/bus-home/bus-chamber/bus-chamber-third-assembly-rop.htm [3 Feb]
In essence there is a consensus between all parties in Wales that this LCO is a good thing, and that powers to legislate on Welsh rightly belong to the Assembly rather than Westminster. Obviously this includes Labour and Plaid, as they form the Government which laid the LCO. So I will concentrate on what the Tories and LibDems have to say:
---quote---
Paul Davies [Conservative]: I thank the Minister for this
important statement today. We have all
waited a long time for its publication—a
statement, by the way, that was promised in
the first year of the One Wales Government. I
very much hope that the new legislation will
build upon the successful measures
introduced by Conservative Governments in
the 1980s and 1990s. I am pleased that the
record that the Government published with
the statement yesterday confirmed those
successes.
This announcement currently only confirms a
transfer of the power to legislate on the
Welsh language to this place—something
that we, as the official opposition and the
Conservative group, agree with completely. I
agree with the Minister that it makes sense
that legislating on the Welsh language should
be done by this institution. We look forward
very much to the specific Measures that the
Government will bring forward in this field
in the near future. We will consider them in
more detail when the details are placed
before us.
... I would like to add to the
consensus by welcoming the statement and
the proposed Order that you published
yesterday. It is important that the National
Assembly for Wales legislates on matters
relating to the Welsh language. If we have an
Assembly for any reason, it must be to
legislate on the Welsh language. I welcome
the fact that the Government is progressing
towards adding to the powers that we have to
legislate in this field. This will be warmly
welcomed by all political parties and, as you
said, Minister, no matter what discussions we
have in the future about the content of any
Measure, we are in unanimous agreement
that the Assembly should legislate on this
issue. If we start on that basis, the ensuing
discussion will be more positive and
constructive than any other discussion.
----
Eleanor Burnham [LibDem]: On behalf of the
Liberal Democrats, I welcome this historic
statement on the Welsh language.
... I believe that there is consensus here; we
have been discussing the promotion of the
Welsh language for years, here and on the
national eisteddfod maes. The former
Minister, Jenny Randerson, did her best on
our behalf, and we have always had
consensus on this issue in Liberal Democrat
conferences. I look forward to hearing the
answers on these burning issues, but, on the
whole, I welcome the fact that the Minister
has been working so conscientiously. I wish
us all good luck as we do our best for our
language.
---endquote---
Those statements are translations of what was said in Welsh. But here is the first contribution from someone who doesn't speak the language:
---quote---
David Melding [Cons]: I am pleased that, as a proud
Anglo-Welshman, it falls upon me to make
the first contribution in English. My attempts
to learn the language of heaven are bearing
some fruit, but I am afraid that spontaneous
contributions are yet beyond me because I
have to be heavily scripted. However, I give
the Minister two and three-quarter cheers for
this legislative competence Order. I reserve a
quarter because he is a Minister. [Laughter.]
As a sceptical Tory, I would always be
suspicious of Ministers, of whatever political
stripe, including my own—perhaps more so
of my own because I would know some of
the tricks they get up to. When I introduced
my LCO, there was a sense among some of
us that the Government was stalling and in
trouble and lacked the will to bring about this
transfer of powers to the Assembly. I think
that you have completely dispelled that, and I
am really delighted that there seems to be a
great will to do this on the part of all parties,
which demonstrates a level of consensus that
I think is very precious and that stands in
sharp contrast to the situation even 30 years
ago, when the last big debate on devolution
occurred in the 1970s. There was not that
feeling of unity across the Welsh nation at
You have brought this legislative competence
Order forward very tactfully and with proper
consideration for those who do not speak
Welsh and for other political parties.
---endquote---
So, who best speaks for the people of Wales? Surely the people and parties we ourselves elected to our own National Assembly.
Complain about this comment
message 159....
You said " hiraeth means intense longing or homesickness".
Correct me if I am wrong, but that is exactly how you put it in your message ..Yes?
Now, let us see what I can come up with....
Oxford Concise Dictionary on Historical Principles.
NOSTALGIA: first used in 1770, from the modern Latin, nostalgia= (1688, rendering German heimweh) .from the Greek, to return home=pain(sorry cannot give Greek letters)
A form of melancholia caused by prolonged absence from home, or ones homeland. SEVER HOMESICKNESS,
Can you detect any difference between Hiraeth and nostalgia then? 'cos I cannot.
Complain about this comment
Messages 166 and 167.....
If anyone resides in a parallel universe it has to be those who somehow have it in their heads that Wales is called Cymru.
A none existent place, much in the style of Glochamorah, or Brigadoon.
Something to be longed for, but never to find in reality.
A place where wonderful happenings take place, where the folk, admirably, all chatter away in a ancient tongue that will replace any other in the fora where it can count.
Well you can dream on, but when reality kicks in, you will find your dream scape is a mirage and cannot be reached. The more you go towards it, the further it will go away from you, until that day you dread, it simply disappears, and all hopes of that Cymru wonderland will simply fade from memory.
I am glad to hear your tear ducts seem to be in working order, very soon yours will need to be in full working order when all you have will turn to dust and ashes.
Complain about this comment
DrachenFuhr:
You're going to get one heck of a big shock then in future elections, ngwasi, when the non-Labour voters turn away from Plaid Cymru for one of the other parties.
Jill Evans already worried. Fancy that, pipped by the Lib Dems for one of the 4 Euro seats lol!
Complain about this comment
message 172,...
'So who best speaks for the people of Wales? Surely the people and parties we ourselves elected to our own national assembly'
You are joking of course.
Nowhere in the world does a less than 1% with a turn out of less than 50% hold sway in an election.
The total vote for devolution was less than 25%, that in case you do not recognise it, is 1 quarter of those eligible to vote, voted FOR.
I am not saying that 3 quarters voted against, but when and only when, we get a election based on a minimum vote of at least 66%, (even higher if I had the power to call the shots), then you could realistically state the above paragraph I copied from the tail end of your message.
I would be inclined to rethink your somewhat ambitious summation of the events, particularly keeping in mind that there is a referendum supposed to come from the current activities of the All Wales Convention gatherings.
Complain about this comment
mapexx-
I can say, as a Welsh speaker, I know my language!
You can 'hiraethu' for a country, a loved one, a place you once visited. It's an intense longing, a heartbreaking feeling that one can feel for a number of things.
Nostalgia is sentimentality, this is how the word is used these days. It's what you feel when you watch an old film from your childhood, or a hear a band you liked as a teenager. They mean different things. You ask any Welsh speaker, and they would tell you the same thing.
There is a beautiful song called 'Hiraeth' and it does not describe nostalgia. It describes heartbreak, longing and sadness.
Yet again, you show your lack of understanding of the language and it's culture.
Honestly, you are such an idiot. You still haven't answered my question about our 'invisible culture'. And to be honest I'm past caring because I don't think you even know what you're going on about. You need to get over this creepy obsession you have with the language and it's culture. It's weird. Get a proper hobby.
Complain about this comment
Mapexx # 162
Noah_ssembly #163
You are demonstrating, it seems, an explicit desire to shut down rational discussion in favour of a blanket affirmation of your unexplored prejudices.
My questions at #151 were specific and to the point and indicated what I see as the contradictions in your (specifically M's, but affirmed by N) position.
You both claim or imply [see my discussions for the 'implication' element] that Welsh culture (either Cymreig or Cymraeg, i.e. non-linguistically Welsh or in the Welsh language) doesn't exist. You refuse to discuss the implications of your statements, or what your criteria are. You refuse to engage in a discussion of these assertions.
Since you reject every answer offered to you be ever member of this discussion, in vulgar terms such as:
-"crap"
-"not interested"
-"all you have will turn to dust and ashes"
- etc.
I asked you quite simply 'what kind of an answer would you accept', i.e. what qualifies as 'culture' in your eyes. The best you can say is (#162)"
"it is there, staring you in the face every time you turn on your TV, or read a newspaper, or in general terms whenever you exit your front door."
or
"the 'culture' that, Yes, the whole western world is steeped in."
I suggest (and suggested) that your criteria (being entirely nonspecific if not entirely absent) allow on one interpretation for no cultural differentiation between *any part of Europe* if any part of the world.
Either that, or this culture of the "whole western world" (which includes therefore, French, Breton, Spanish, Catalan, Ladin, Basque, Occitanian, Kashubian) also might just includes Welsh. So perhaps Welsh may be allowed to "have a culture" even if certain elements of it "broom dancing" or poetry perhaps, you may not like (just as you're free not to like Morris Dancing, Flamenco dancing, Wordsworth, Beethoven, crocheting, rap music or string theory - it doesn't mean they don't exist, or that they are not valuable).
You have three choices, surely, based on your supposition that "your" culture exists but that of other people doesn't:
i) there is no culture of others and therefore only one single culture,
but, therefore (my further deduction, implicit in your position)
ib) you have no right to use terms such as 'English', 'British', 'French' or 'Welsh' since if you do not have the conceptual tools to distinguish cultures then you have no basis on which to talk about them.
or, more sensibly, I think:
ii) we allow that - yes - these cultures do exists but, just as I know nothing of the culture of certain Fenno-Ugric speaking parts of Russia east of the Urals, I also know nothing of the culture of Wales, since I live in a mental space called 'England'/ 'Britain'/ whatever.
My serious questions (#151) remain. I am asking for the very simple but fundamental assistance from you in explaining on what basis you would allow a discussion to take place.
Your current positions strike me as being totalitarian, fundamentalist, quasi-racist and solipsistic (I mean this entirely seriously, based on my arguments above).
***
Oh, and on Dafydd Iwan's "nasty", "nationalist" "ditties". That might be an interesting debate to have - it might lead into a discussion of the wider Welsh cultural space. I'll come back to that one perhaps.
Complain about this comment
MH message 172:
Your last sentence makes you sound like a dictator. Welcome to the boards.... just what we need, another oppresive language fanatic.
Personally I would be pleased to see a few more mechanicaltattoos around here, not just more of the same
Complain about this comment
message 178....
You take the debate to a completely new and subterranean level.
But to clarify one thing...
There is NO 'culture' that is apparent to the non Cymraeg Welsh.
I accept there may be, to those who consistently opt for the Cymraeg aspect of Welsh life, but to the vast majority it is not only a closed book, but a book they do not even, or ever, think of taking off the shelf in their lives.
Their 'culture' as stated, but which YOU cannot seem to understand, is that enjoyed across the rest of the western influenced global community.
As for the rest, you just waffle on and on in a circular motion, regurgitating the same old, yes ...'crap'.
You ask for answers that we are not prepared to give, because there is no interest in the sort of blind alley debate you wish to steer us into.
All you wish to do, is to attempt the impossible, that is get us to accept there is value and validity in what you see as essential to the lives of Welsh people, but which, in fact, impinges on a very minute number.
And, let me get this point over to you, WE are not in that number.
As for your idiotic comment about the patriotism re British, French etc, that is something determined by a geo/poloitical structures called... BORDERS.
As far as I am concerned, they exist purely in the mental state of political expressed identity, I personally would have them taken down, along with those, like the mess in Cardiff Bay, as, beyond having an attachement to my home territory, I would be quite willing to fall under a global administration, and to see the back of the political system we are presently forced to accept.
But that is a global strategy, whereas, you are parochial in your ambitions and demands.
Ther's no accounting for taste.
Complain about this comment
Bostoniwr,
Unfortunately you won't get an answer from these people. Why anyone would want to define culture is beyond me actually; as it is all of the things that have been mentioned by sensible, intelligent people here, and so much more besides. Ambiguities in important, fundamental things aren't weaknesses, they add to the riches and make everything far more interesting at a very deep level. Culture is intrinsically creative, and you cannot fully describe that process, nor would you want to - if you're sensible.
Wales as a nation exists - many, many, many more than 80% of the people - which seems to be a magic number for mapexx - believe that. And Wales, thank god, is complex enough to possess a culture that exists in Welsh and English and both together, and now in other languages as well.
I just want to celebrate that fact.
Complain about this comment
#172, MH
Thanks for the posting - the consensus and lack of aggression shown in those quotes make for reassuring reading.
It's good to see more confirmation that the bilious positions ranting on this thread are indeed merely isolated individuals and that they in no way represent the opinion of any of the political parties.
#179, Cardiffian, referring to #172, MH:
"Your last sentence makes you sound like a dictator"
?? MH talks about enjoying the consensus expressed among elected representatives of the people of Wales, and you accuse him of being dicatorial??
MH, if you are new to this discussion board, don't take it personally - there are many voices here which deal only in poison.
Complain about this comment
message 177....
Don't tell me you are going to be another one who turns to insults and nastiness, because you have been caught out.
The interpretation you gave for Hiraeth is the one that appears in all of my Cymraeg/Saes dictionaries, and I have a few of them, it also matches the meaning given on various on line encyclopedia, written by educated Welsh academics.
Now you wish to alter the meaning for another set of words, that effectively mean the same, but with a slight sideways slant.
As I mentioned to you previously, I am supportive of your argument about the way your language is being slewed towards being a political weapon. I admire your stance in defending it, and I certainly am not antipathetic to your language.
As for culture, that has to be demonstrated.
The amount of uptake must be exceptionally minuscule if it cannot be seen anywhere in Wales, except at functions specifically arranged to put on a show.
There is no real folk dress, no public works of art, that can be called specifically Cymraeg in nature, there are some local gatherings in pubs in some small areas, where poetry and music forms the entertainment.
But where can the average guy and his partner go to join in, unless they have the language as an entrance ticket? Their own fault, no doubt.
Out of strong language areas, nowhere, as I can detect.
It is, to put it simply...exclusive!
You are, along with many of your kind, attempting to equate the use of your language with 'culture', they are not the same, except here in Wales.
Remove the language and what you profess is the case immediately becomes apparently not so.
All that would be left is a few folk gatherings, and some pleasant evenings in the pub. Nothing different than occurs all over the UK in fact. But in another language.
Mention has been made of the Basques and other small groups of localised but distinctively separated [peolles.
They do have a variety of cultural events many all year round, but in the main their ceremonials are to do with a religious culture, not one based on a language alone. And that is the difference we cannot detect here in Wales, with those who claim for a 'culture'.
As I say, it is invisible to the vast bulk of the population in Wales, in the main, I suggest, because they are totally disinterested in it, and will be even more so if they detect it is being thrust at them, by dictat, from a third tier of government, using your adored language as a Trojan horse, as Shrek calls it, and as a political cudgel, which is costing them ever more taxation money to prop up.
I would finally suggest that you check up on the words you use, if you are locally altering their meaning I would think your lexicographers would like to be informed.
I can only go on what I read in dictionaries scribed and published by those erudute folk.
Complain about this comment
#180 Mapexx
Most of what you write simply repeats previous evasive comments of yours, but you do (beyond your viciousness and rudeness) introduce one novel point which I'd like to ask you to clarify:
If "borders" are all that define culture (as you claim, and one must presume you mean borders of sovereign states as currently exist, rather than of national, linguistic, religious territories, etc. which are more fluid), then how can you talk about an Anglo-Welsh culture while disallowing a Welsh-Welsh culture? Surely there are no more borders to define the Anglo-Welsh than the Welsh-Welsh? THey stand or fall together, then, and since you disallow the one you disallow the other. We are consequently all "UK"sh (or EU'sh).
Shurely shome mishtake! Your position is still entirely unsubstantiable.
Also, you entirely misrepresent me. You say, "you are parochial in your ambitions and demands"
Please tell me what "ambitions" I have declared or "demands" I have made, beyond requesting a civil debate here! I associate myself with no political party in any country (apart perhaps occasionally with the Kurdish minority party in Turkey), and with no entrenched position. You dissimulate entirely.
Complain about this comment
message 184...
You, along with others, sense emphatic and robust wordage as viciousness and rudeness.
So be it, I have no time to be constantly dripping politeness to people who cannot be the same themselves, (look to your recent vitriolic attack on ShreK Girl, for proof of your own shortcomings). I can readily believe you must work or exist in some sort of gentle environment where a raised voive, Lord forbid a raised fist would be the end of your comfoirtable world.
I come from a different environment, I spent my life working where the needs of practicality and physicality was paramount, no time, or need for pussyfooting about with please's, thank you's, and do you mind's?, at ever other breath.
No nice convivial chats over the water cooler or the mid morning cup of coffee in comfortable warm, and dry surroundings.
Get the blasted job done, and now, not when someone pollitely thinks you might manage it, that is if you don't mind, in your own time, sort of a way.
If you cannot stand the heat, then there's the kitchen door.
I do not stand on ceremony, you gets what it says on the blog, like it or lump it.
Blunt and strident, are my watchwords.
I think most of what I have to say on the invisible culture is laid out in the message previous to your last one...
number 183.
Complain about this comment
mapexx,
In 183 you ask:
"Don't tell me you are going to be another one who turns to insults and nastiness, because you have been caught out."
and then in 185 you say:
"You, along with others, sense emphatic and robust wordage as viciousness and rudeness.
So be it, I have no time to be constantly dripping politeness"
Clearly you don't.
It isn't your lack of courtesy that makes you inconsistent, it's your lack of intellect and your inability to partake of debate. That is why I was delighted to hear that you will be a leading member of the No Campaign. That really is good news.
You clearly have nothing to contribute to a discussion on culture, however.
Complain about this comment
Mechanical Tattoo said:
"I can say, as a Welsh speaker, I know my language!
You can 'hiraethu' for a country, a loved one, a place you once visited. It's an intense longing, a heartbreaking feeling that one can feel for a number of things.
Nostalgia is sentimentality, this is how the word is used these days. It's what you feel when you watch an old film from your childhood, or a hear a band you liked as a teenager. They mean different things. You ask any Welsh speaker, and they would tell you the same thing.
There is a beautiful song called 'Hiraeth' and it does not describe nostalgia. It describes heartbreak, longing and sadness."
As someone from England I think the word you describe as hireath and nostalgia probably do mean the same thing.
Your own example I believe is a very good choice, that of a band you liked as a teenager.
When I hear a brass band it reminds me of my childhood in the mining towns and villages of Yorkshire. I have a longing for the place when I hear a brass band, wherever it is playing because those associations with my place of early experience come back to me.
Thank you Mecanical tattoo for confirming for me that nostalgia and hreath are one and the same.
Complain about this comment
*183 Mappex
An English Welsh dictionary (or dictionary between any other languages for that matter) would be tediously long if it attempted to define every word in the fully in the context of the new language.
Imagine this entry: "Hiraeth - n.f. A longing or homesickness, but sort of combined with a feeling of loss, and an almost sickly sentimentality, as if one is somehow incomplete without the subject of the hirareth, a bit like depression, but not neccessarily long term, it can be a fleeting feeling of down-ness, or an incapacitating weight... (goes on for 3 pages)
Anyone who speaks more than one language fluently will recognise that some words don't translate - thry come with allsorts of half remembered cultural, literary and historical baggage. Think of a second language English speaker, and how they misuse some words, because they do not understand the subtle nuances of that word, just the dictionary translation.
I'm interested that you accept that there may be a Welsh culture. More interesting is to see that because you don't understand it (being in Welsh) it has no worth.
Complain about this comment
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
I suggest you take a walk to your local library and request a gander at the OXFORD Dictionary on Historical Principles. 44 volumes, if the library is up to scratch.
There you will find the etymological background, historically dated, and notated, fully documented, even to some length, at times taking up almost a half a page of close printed very small text, for each and every word.
So please do not come the clever clogs with your half baked 'explainations', when it was not even you the message was aimed towards.
Keep in mind something else, I may not be a Cymreag speaker, but I was brought up by a family who were, and the Hiraeth was drummed into me from birth almost.
So I am fully aware of the 'nuances' you mentioned.
Complain about this comment
#190 mapexx wrote:
"I may not be a Cymreag (sic) speaker, but I was brought up by a family who were, and the Hiraeth was drummed into me from birth almost.
So I am fully aware of the 'nuances' you mentioned."
From a study of your comments, 'nuance' is something you might have heard of, but you clearly don't have much idea what it means, now 'sledgehammer'....
You are right, you are not a Welsh speaker. You have shown not only a complete ignorance of the Language but a contempt for it too.
I am bilingual. Welsh was my first language. In my opinion although hiraeth can mean nostalgia they do not coincide. Nostalgia is a longing for something from the past. Hiraeth also means a longing for something from which one is separated... by time, by distance, and relationships.
It is simplistic to think that words can just be translated.. that there are exact equivalents. That is false. Its a common mistake made by people who have knowledge of only one language, or who have a very basic, dictionary level knowledge of a second language.
Another common misconception about language is that it is simply a means of communication. One new commentator on this blog has shown that 'she' things of language in such basic terms.
It is not. Ask any poet, or read some poetry or prose.
Complain about this comment
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
*190 Mappex
I apologise profusely, I was unaware that one could only comment on inaccuracies aimed specifically at ones self. I will obviously have to refresh my understanding of the board rules!
On the point of the "OXFORD Dictionary on Historical Principles. 44 volumes" - I'm sure that it gives accurate definitions of English words. I doubt very much that it cross references with Welsh words, which is what we were discussing. Of course, if you could ppoint me towards an English Welsh dictionary with a similar level of detail, we could have a look at 'hiraeth' together.
Complain about this comment
message 193....
The call for you to go look at the Con OX Dict on Hist Princ's was to demonstrate that the dictionaries I have to hand are more than just simple single word translations.
That said, no matter how you stretch, wriggle and twist, the meanings of the two words under discussion are without doubt almost to the smallest of nuances, identical in their meaning, AND, in take up by those who use them, no matter which tongue is being employed.
Or are you, and that other person, saying that the English useage cannot contain the same level of sentimentality, longing, homesickness feeling, etc etc, than when the Welsh person uses Hiraeth for the exact same purpose?
Maybe the Anglo monoglot is without emotion, as that seems to be the tenor of your previous commentary.
Complain about this comment
If you compare:
i) the definition of 'nostalgia' given by the Oxford English Dictionary (second edition with additions and clarifications - i.e. the full OED, not even the handy Concise version which Mapexx uses)
with
ii) the definition of 'hiraeth' given by Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru (the Welsh historical dictionary, compiled on the pattern of the OED)
you will find that the words are not identical. Close, but no cigar. The one major difference between 'nostalgia' and 'hiraeth' is that one never feels nostalgia for a dead person, whereas one does feel 'hiraeth' in that case.
The same will happen if you offer any single word, or even most combinations of English words - you won't get there. As explained earlier. This is why different languages exist - because they say different things, and say them differently.
'Hiraeth', quite simply, extends over a larger range of meanings than any single English word, and combines emotions together in a way which is - quite simply - untranslatable.
English, likewise, has many words which are untranslateable into Welsh, or any other language. That's how language works.
A nice essay on this is Walter Benjamin's "The Task of the Translator", in the volume of his essays, "Illuminations". The languages he uses are mainly German, French and English, but the principles extend further.
Complain about this comment
Message 195.....
So, because probed in depth, one must say that Hiraeth and nostalgia are not totally identical.
Again, pedantic explainations, which fly far above the heads of the ordinary personn.
All well and good, but the average person in Wales and elsewhere, does not apply either term IN DEPTH do they?
The terms are, for 99% or more of the time, NOT so 'academically' called into use.
In fact most folk would be hard put to even begin to contemplate such minuscule nuances, as teased out by studious translators.
The translator may well have a slight problem in corresponding one with the other, but the man in the street simply calls into his terminology the basics of the matter, to the extent as descrobed before, sentimentality, a deep feeling of homesickness, and so on.
If ALL words were studied by the man in the street to the depth that you have bored us with, over your last few messages, no one would be communicating, for the simple reason everyone would walk off totally baffled by the complete nonsense of it all.
Complain about this comment
Re 196
Again you are inconsistent mapexx. You've been shouting at us that we must accept the definition of the OED, but now that you are losing the argument you're saying definitions aren't important anyway!
Also, you don't understand how dictionaries are compiled. The entries are created along lines of the history of a word, usage, nuances, exceptions etc. etc. etc.
You're newest line of attack now seems to be that Bostoniwr is too clever and too educated!!
Come on Wales!
Complain about this comment
message 197....
No I am not inconsistent, the reasons I gave re the actual street level usage are totally valid, and your referring back to the academical aspects are fallacious.
I did not say that the OED definition MUST be accepted, what I did say was the defini9tion I gave, from that dictionary was enough to cover the NORMAL use of nostalgia and hiraeth as virtually identical but in different languages.
You can waffle as much as you like, but you are the one attempting to stretch you own argument, which can possibly be sustained in and academic framework but as stated, at street level, the two are identical, to almost 100%,
I will allow that in a studied interpretation there could be a minute difference, but none that even a fairly fluent Cymraeg speaker could put his finger on, with absolute definition.
I do understand how dictionaries are complied, but you are opting to tell me what?... that you are so damned clever you can be superior to me, I am afraid I have just your enlarged ego and sense of self importance to go on, for that.
Finally I do not 'shout' about whatever it is I write about; on a blog, shouting is done with capitals, I use capitals ony for emphasis, as I am too lazy to keep switching back and forth to italics.
The amount of blather your friend uses comes very close to ...no... exceeds, the bad cook who overcooks the pudding, so that all she gets after a long spell in the kitchen is an arid contraction of what she set out to produce.
Complain about this comment
Re 198
Believe me, I claim no great intellect! But insulting intellect (and knowledge) was a familiar theme within the administration of George W Bush - I do hope you're not following his example.
And why do you say 'she'?
Complain about this comment
Mappex
Has it occurred to you that the academics who compile dictionaries find out how 'the man in the street' uses the word, and record it. Thus if there are differences in definitions between words in different languages that is because the man in the street uses them differently, not because some academic has decided that they are different.
Of course, hiraeth is one of many many words whose meanings cover different shades of emotion / experience (and possibly even emotions / experiences that have no description in another language).
As to your question about how non welsh-speaking peope see things - I'm sorry. I don't know! Neither would I be arrogant enough to assume that I did.
Complain about this comment
Message 199....
Please elucidate.... where did I apply the 'she' in message 198?
message 200...
I know quite well how academics obtain their information, but that is not the point, what is the point is that the man in the street, may well, occasionally stretch the usage of a word to fit a particular circumstance, but I am talking about the average use of the word. You seem to think that because the word Hiraeth is a Cymraeg word it is ONLY used in a Cymraeg, very stretched, way.
Well, stick with it, maybe YOU personally use it that way, but in doing so you would NOT be one of the average would you?
You would become a 'specialist', seeking to reduce the 'general' meaning to a defined state,... just to suit your argument as I see it.
To refer to your second paragraph, you again are attempting, maybe unconsciously, to say that because the word is Cymraeg, in any other language similar aspects of emotiveness cannot be expressed.
Rubbish!
Complain about this comment
Re 201
You sound a bit like the pub bore there, I'm afraid. Your inability to put together a coherent is becoming embarrassing.
To answer your question :
"The amount of blather your friend uses comes very close to ...no... exceeds, the bad cook who overcooks the pudding, so that all she gets after a long spell in the kitchen is an arid contraction of what she set out to produce."
Complain about this comment
*201 Mappex
As far as I know, I use Hiraeth in the way that other Welsh speakers use it. The reason I think that is that I have learnt to use the word (as with most of the rest of my Welsh) by hearing others use it, talk about it, experience it etc. I'm guessing you learnt most of your English in the same way.
I wonder if the fact that you have disagreed with a number of Welsh speakers (not just me) about the meaning of Hiraeth may be significant?
My second paragraph, bu the way, meant to say that the experience / emotion was not neccessarily described in every other language, not that the Welsh had some especially unique position amongst world languages.
Anyway, I'm going back to discuss politics now (sorry to anyone still with us who's bored by this particular sideroad!), so I suspect that we will just have to remain in disagreement.
Complain about this comment
#201 mapexx wrote:
"You seem to think that because the word Hiraeth is a Cymraeg word it is ONLY used in a Cymraeg, very stretched, way."
If you took the trouble to learn Welsh, you'd be much more qualified to pronounce on the Language. As it is, it seems you aren't qualified at all. It doesn't help your case to talk from a position of ignorance. 'Knowledge is power'... so your arguments are weak, and you often resort to rants based on opinion, with few facts.
Your comments indicate to me that you are dead against Wales and everything Welsh, in the sense that all that matters to you is English and all things British.
Now, I had to learn English. I had no choice in the matter, and yes, I'm glad that I'm fluent in it. Its a very useful and necessary language in this world. We all accept that. That does not diminish the love I have for my mother tongue. Being bilingual is also an asset in so many ways. For me Welsh is something precious. It would be a disaster if it was lost, and it has come pretty close to that. Thankfully attitudes in the UK today, for all its faults, are more enlightened about minorities and their rights, including those who are Welsh.
You can happily live your life in Wales and never have to learn a word of Welsh. That is not under threat in any way by any proposed LCO or statute. Yet you complain that all the political parties (in England as well as in Wales) are in favour of supporting the Language. You represent a small minority of political opinion. You blame Plaid for it, but that party attracts non-Welsh-speaking members in considerable numbers. Its main policy plank is self-determination, and that is why I'm inclined to vote for it, not because of the Language, but because the political system in Britain so damned awful.
No way am I an apologist for Plaid, but its a democratically constituted party. Its credentials are not in question. Whatever its policies are on the Language or any other issue, unless it can persuade a majority of people to vote for them, it will not progress.
You should accept that speaking Welsh and political affiliation are not linked. Welsh speakers belong to all parties and none. Some are active in politics, many are not. You do your case a disservice by unwarranted generalisations, something that is not uncommon on this blog.
Complain about this comment
message 204....
My how you love to see your own in print.
A: I am not in the slightest interested in you 'mother tongue' but that does not mean I cannot comment on the meaning of just one word in it.
The debate was simply about the absolutely marginal difference between Hiraeth and Nostalgia.
I have no other interest, as stated.
B: But here you go, keyboard diarrhoea again, off on a tangent that has nothing to do with the matter in hand.
I do NOT, disparage the language or it's users, I, in common with quite a few others on these blogs, do castigate the use of the language as a political weapon.
Obvious to us, but to you, an innocuous motion.
I stand up against the cost to the taxpaying public of the whole of Britain, nearly sixty millions of whom will never ever have access to, or make use of, the language in any way shape or form.
All this, just to sate the political ambitions of a miserly few thousands.
You have been given leeway at every turn, but when analysed it becomes very obvious that even amongst the language fluents, there is little appetite for that which you have been given.
S4C, Radio Cymru, the immediate switch to English outside of the school environment by the bulk of the school kids, the take of of bills etc in English, even in supposed strong Cymraeg speaking areas, all hardly indulged in, Cymraeg speakng or not..
You say the political parties are as one over the language.
Let me wise you up to one fact, the parties are NOT the people, and when the people get ready to take necessary action, you can be sure they will not be all that enamoured of a section of the UK being sawn off, just to accomodate a bunch of nationalist control freaks.
But as a obvious nationalist you would naturally deny that to be the agenda.
Complain about this comment
Re 205
You certainly have a touch of the verbals mappy...! Consistently long ... oh dear, I'm mixing metaphors already! I'd better shut up before you call me an ignoramus again ...
Complain about this comment
message 206....
You are obviously one of that very 'few thousand'.
But I note with a sort of slight interest that you draw attention to MY long message/s. whilst studiously overlooking those of those who opt for your side of the debate.
Yourself, brynt41, bostinianiwr et al.
What's the matter, English speaking Welsh not your cup of tea?
Complain about this comment
Re 207
Yes, it's strange isn't it how some people's diarrhoea seems to be even less ... substantial?
Complain about this comment
message 208....
I see from that message your medical condition has somewhat dried up.
Or are you just storing it up for another lengthy crack at the blog sometime later?
Can hardly wait old fruit!
Complain about this comment
Re 209
Can you actually point out a long entry from me? Just out of interest!
Complain about this comment
message 210...
Apologies for not answering, I overlooked your question..
My lapse of concentration accredited your submissions with those of Drechenfyre's.
I will try to ensure it does not occur again.
Complain about this comment
View these comments in RSS