Seán Kelly has called for Irish to be treated equally to other European languages

“Immediate and sustained action” is needed by the European Parliament to ensure Irish is treated equally to other European languages.

That is according to the Irish MEP – and former president of the GAA – Seán Kelly.

He claimed that Irish speakers in Northern Ireland, who hold Irish passports, can face problems in applying for jobs with the parliament.

He has also called for it to establish a link with Queen’s University Belfast (QUB) in order to recruit more Irish-speaking staff.

Mr Kelly has written to the president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, raising his concerns.

Irish language challenges

Irish was recognised as an official language of the European Union (EU) in 2007.

It is one of 24 official languages in the EU, which means that speeches in the parliament and documents are translated to and from Irish.

But since then a shortage of translation staff has meant that the number of EU documents translated into Irish has been limited.

A European Commission report in 2021 said that EU institutions employed 138 Irish speakers, although over half of the jobs were temporary.

It said that although Irish translation had increased, recruiting enough Irish speaking staff was “the main challenge” to providing full services in Irish.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/

Full article: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy68jpjq9glo