The idea that the Government should do more to facilitate migrants to this country to learn English is admirable. It would both help the assimilation process by reducing some of the psychological barriers that feed suspicion and hostility, and make it easier for migrants to integrate into the workforce and the community.
Indeed, we could go further and follow the British and the US in providing courses in citizenship, teaching those newly arrived such concepts intrinsic to our civic culture as "the tribunal of inquiry" and "the round system", not to mention, modules on "the place of the GAA in Irish life"and "the Rising".
But the announcement by Minister for Justice Brian Lenihan that he will incorporate provisions in the forthcoming Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill to make passing a language test compulsory for those applying for citizenship smacks of crowd-pleasing and headline-grabbing. It has more to do with appearing to be actively engaged with a perceived problem than tackling it. While many new arrivals do have problems with English, is there really a significant number who, by the end of the five years' residence required for citizenship, can not cope with the language?
The real challenge is to provide new arrivals with tuition, and teachers in schools already severely overstretched in trying to provide language teaching to the children of immigrants will smile wryly at the Minister's gesture. As the chairman of the Immigrant Council of Ireland John Cunningham has argued "if the Government were to make competency in English a requirement for long-term residency or citizenship, it has an obligation to ensure there are enough courses available to allow migrants with limited language skills the opportunity to learn." That obligation has certainly not been met yet.
And those immigrants struggling to understand the way we do things here will find an illuminating insight into our political culture and sacred cows in the Minister's announcement that those tested will have the choice of demonstrating their linguistic competence in English or Irish. In other words, someone who speaks fluent Mandarin and Irish, but not a word of English, will qualify for citizenship. And yet the Minister tells us that his purpose is to ensure that immigrants can demonstrate "a capacity to communicate with their future fellow citizens"! Mr Lenihan's Dublin West constituency is clearly a place apart. Perhaps, Minister, it would be appropriate to suggest that those aspiring citizens who opt to demonstrate their linguistic capacity only in Irish could be required to live in the Gaeltacht.