All Gaeltacht regions should come under the authority of one language agency, a conference has been told.
At the annual meeting in Spiddal, Co Galway, of F≤ram na Gaeltachta, a representative of Eagra∅ocht na Scoileanna Gaeltachta, Ms Mβire ┴ine N∅ Fhlathartaith, said the best way to ensure that native Irish speakers secured services was to establish one local government authority with responsibility for all Gaeltacht districts.
"We need a county council of our own throughout the country for the Gaeltacht," she said at the weekend. Such a structure could deal with issues such as education, planning and health and would provide a single point of contact for Gaeltacht communities, thereby replacing the multitude of Government departments, agencies and county councils.
F≤ram na Gaeltachta, a community-based organisation with delegates from all Gaeltacht regions, also urged the Government to redress the lack of Irish-language text books and other language resources in Gaeltacht schools.
Ms Mβire U∅ Rβinne, headmistress of Scoil R≤nβn in Connemara, said Gaeltacht regions "would remain in trouble" until educational matters were properly addressed. She urged the Government to enact fully the Education Act (1998) under which a development agency was to have been established under Article 31 to look after Irish-language and Gaeltacht education. To date the Government had only appointed a chairman to the agency.
"Unless fluent speakers are produced to attend to second- and third-level (education), there will be huge language problems in the Gaeltacht in the future. Indeed, it as well to say that there will be little Irish unless matters change."
Delegates also discussed the need to provide support services and classes to people with no Irish who had moved to the Gaeltacht and how best to encourage teenagers to use the language in preference to English. It was also suggested that planning should become the sole responsibility of ┌darβs na Gaeltachta.
A 12-person executive committee was elected with Ms Tr∅ona N∅ Rβinne, a regional organiser with Gl≤r na nGael and a native of the Connemara Gaeltacht, as its chairwoman.
Meanwhile, delegates at the Conradh na Gaeilge ardfheis in Dublin at the weekend have unanimously called on the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, to give a public assurance that the Language Equality Bill would be enacted before next year's election.
The motion was put forward by the Conradh president, Mr Tomβs Mac Ruair∅, who said the "continuous delaying" in publishing the proposed legislation smacked of "hypocrisy of the highest order".
The Government had said that the Bill, which aims to provide services for Irish speakers in the State sector, was to be published this autumn. However, it will not now be published until next spring.