Citizens for whom Irish is their natural or most convenient language have been consistently denied their right to use it in official business, writes Eoin Ó Murchú.
The passing of the Official Languages Act last year was met by widespread media indifference. Only the Irish-language media gave the debates on the Bill any systematic coverage as it passed Dáil and Seanad without opposition.
But now that a beginning has been made to implementing the Act, and that it is clear that Minister Éamon Ó Cuív and Coimisinéir Teanga, Seán Ó Cuirreáin, are serious about making sure that the Act bites, there has been a chorus of outrage in the media, with Kevin Myers in The Irish Times and Philip Boucher-Hayes and Aoife Kavanagh on RTÉ radio leading the charge.
But apart from the valid nationalist desire to strengthen the Irishness of Ireland, of which the language is a central part, there is also a democratic issue.
English speakers are, almost invariably, oblivious to these democratic and human rights aspects, as if speaking or using Irish were an eccentric aberration which should not be banned but which should be discreetly kept private. Their assumption is that everyone can speak English and that it's perverse to insist on using Irish in any official transactions. Humbug and hypocrisy, I think, are the words that Kevin Myers uses.
For Philip Boucher-Hayes, on RTÉ's Five Seven Live, it's unbelievable that an Irish speaker, from Conamara for example, should expect to have medical treatment in his or her own language; while Aoife Kavanagh, on Morning Ireland, was worried that people from outside the Gaeltacht would not recognise the names of Gaeltacht localities if given in their Irish language form.
In a way, of course, this is trivial stuff, but the Official Languages Act is far from trivial and, I would argue, very much overdue.
Since the establishment of the Free State, and particularly since the introduction of the 1937 constitution, Bunreacht na hÉireann, Irish has been recognised as the national language of the State. Bunreacht na hÉireann underlines that political statement by giving Irish legal precedence, a view subsequently endorsed by the Courts.
But notwithstanding this constitutional status, in practice citizens for whom Irish is their natural or most convenient language have been consistently denied their right to use it in official business.
While important progress has been made in recent years, with the establishment of Raidió na Gaeltachta and lately TG4, this Act is intended to spell out clearly what rights can be expected in practice in the wider official arena. It is not intended to wave a magic wand and provide everything overnight, but it is intended that all public bodies - health boards, educational boards, planning authorities, local authorities, government departments, state companies and so on - should, on a phased basis, establish the rights of a bilingual society, as exist in Canada, Wales or Belgium.
So, all such bodies will, over time (and a relatively short time of three years or so is envisaged), make sure that such rights are available. Philip Boucher-Hayes might be horrified by it, but Irish speakers from Conamara will be able to access medical treatment in Galway hospital without being forced to use English.
Equally, reports of State bodies must be made available in Irish at the same time as they are made available in English. But why not? Surely, as an Irish speaking journalist, who works in Irish and is most comfortable in that language, I have the right to access this information in the form most convenient to me just as English speakers have the right to such access in their language.
For that is the point. It is not the forcing of anyone to use Irish, it is bringing to an end a system that has forced us to use English. Surely compulsory English is as objectionable to our middle class liberals as the non-existent compulsory Irish they complain about so bitterly?
Place names in another vexed issue for the critics of the Act. In his play Translations, Brian Friel describes the politics of the process whereby the Anglicisation of Ireland was imposed on its landscape; and it is an ironic reality that it is only now, over 80 years after the founding of the Free State, that place names in their Irish language form are being given legal status, even in the Gaeltacht. And that henceforth in the rest of the country, the Irish name must be in the same size and form as the English language version. Equality rules from now on.
Why is all this so objectionable to English speakers. Are people really unable to read Dún Laoghaire or Cóbh, no matter how they pronounce these names? The opposition is inspired only by bigotry, not by reason.
But is all this necessary? Even if the cost is not large, would the money not be better spent on other things, on hospitals or on better language teaching?
If the hospital argument is adopted, it could equally well be applied to libraries, to orchestras, to museums and so on. Why should it only apply to Irish?
And as to how to spend money effectively on Irish, making the language visible in public life is a vital part of maintaining a belief among native speakers and others that it is a valued and respected part of our life. And making it possible for people to use the language in official dealings with State bodies is a fundamental human right for Irish speakers in their own country.
For we are not second class citizens, or temporary blow-ins. We do not seek to ram our language down your throats, but equally we will not tug our forelocks while you ram yours down ours.
- Eoin Ó Murchú is the Eagraí Polaitíochta (Political Editor) of Raidió na Gaeltachta. He is writing here in a purely personal capacity.