The Parliament could have saved me from having to follow Mr Chapman if it had not agreed to that timely motion from Mr MacDonald. I heartily congratulate Mr Chapman on his wonderful renditions. I also congratulate Angus MacDonald on securing the debate on the UN year of indigenous languages and the European day of languages.
It is an enormous privilege for me to hold ministerial responsibility for Scotland’s languages, which is one that I take very seriously. I am delighted that Mr MacDonald has secured a debate that gives me the opportunity of participating on such matters.
Mr MacDonald spoke about his Hebridean roots and the challenges that have resulted from past actions that have served to make it more and more difficult for individuals in Scotland to maintain and continue the linguistic traditions of our country. The energies that are now being put in by a range of different organisations, led by the Government, to overcome those injuries of the past and to preserve and nurture our indigenous languages are a central part of the Government’s agenda. I very much welcome the extensive motion that Mr MacDonald has lodged and the contributions that members around the chamber have made on this important subject.
The Scottish Government welcomes the UN resolution proclaiming 2019 as the international year of indigenous languages and appreciates UNESCO’s work as the leading organisation on the subject. The Government sees the themed year as an excellent opportunity to further promote and preserve our indigenous languages, which play an important part in Scotland’s culture, heritage and future.
The promotion of Scotland’s indigenous languages and dialects is an important component of its international engagement activity. Scotland was the first home nation to sign up as a friend of the themed year, and our partners have prepared a programme of events to contribute to it. In the past 12 months alone, our offices in Berlin, Paris, Brussels and London have all supported events aimed at celebrating Scotland’s linguistic richness. In future, we will continue to invest in policy exchanges and cultural collaborations with international partners.
In September, we published “Arctic Connections, Scotland’s first Arctic policy framework”. In that document, we committed to encouraging new collaborations between Scotland and Arctic communities—such as the Sami and Inuit people—in relation to the promotion of minority indigenous languages, respecting the fact that all languages have their own specific needs and roles.
As members will be aware, the Scottish Government has actively pursued its responsibilities to promote and support all our indigenous languages. We have introduced and supported legislation and have developed our own British Sign Language plan, Gaelic language plan and Scots policy, which make clear our intentions in that respect.
Rhoda Grant made the point that there is a duty in statute in relation to the Gaelic language for us to promote our native languages. The Government takes that duty seriously and we work with others to make sure that we advance it.
I am pleased to say that we have made good progress with Gaelic over recent years in the key areas of broadcasting, the arts and publishing, and we have seen welcome impacts on the economy, jobs, skills and the creative industries. The gains that have been made for the Gaelic language are impressive. We have a successful Gaelic-medium education sector operating within Scottish education. We have an increasing number of Gaelic stand-alone schools. We have a dedicated body—Stòrlann—that was set up to provide resources and support for teachers and pupils. We have benefited from the establishment of a Gaelic TV channel, which has been a success and has transformed broadcasting in Scotland. We also have a Gaelic arts sector that punches above its weight and without question enriches the cultural life of Scotland.
Bòrd na Gàidhlig was established 12 years ago with statutory duties to promote the Gaelic language. Rhoda Grant and Donald Cameron mentioned that there have been some issues of concern about the performance of the board. I assure members that those issues are uppermost in my mind and the Government is actively working with the board to address them.
We have excellent teaching and research in the Gaelic departments of our universities, and the Scottish Parliament has passed with all-party support strong legislation in support of the Gaelic language. An increasing number of local authorities and public bodies have Gaelic plans that list their commitments to Gaelic.
Having said all that, I think that there is still—Mr Finnie and Dr Allan mentioned the issue in their speeches—a challenging agenda that doubts and debates the wisdom and the value of many of those actions to try to protect and nurture the Gaelic language. It is a matter of fact that there is a statutory duty on us to do what we are doing, but there is also a moral duty and a moral imperative on us all to encourage the promotion of our indigenous languages. Gaelic is one of those languages and it merits the support of us all.
We have made progress in taking forward the support of the Gaelic language, but I recognise the necessity for us to put more impetus into that agenda, so, to add to all the activities that I have cited, I established the faster rate of progress initiative in 2018. It has brought together 24 public authorities with the clear aim of agreeing a number of measures that will allow improvements in support of the Gaelic language to be realised in order to achieve the vision of the national Gaelic language plan.
We established five workstreams with priorities and challenges to take forward support of the Gaelic language. The first two are digital learning and media, and the economy and the labour market. I was stunned to learn in the faster rate of progress initiative that two thirds of international visitors who come to Scotland wish to have some experience of the Gaelic language during their visit to Scotland. That is a massive economic opportunity for our tourism sector, and we have to sustain and nurture the Gaelic language to support it.
The next two priorities are community engagement, and participation, usage and learner support. In that regard, Donald Cameron’s comments on the importance of supporting use of the language and Dr Allan’s point about the importance of ensuring that there is community utilisation and utilisation of the language in our public services were important observations to reinforce the work that we are doing. I commend Comhairle nan Eilean Siar for the work that it is doing in partnership with Highlands and Islands Enterprise on developing a community approach to encouraging greater use of the language.
The final workstream in the programme is on the recruitment and retention of teachers in Gaelic-medium education, which I view as being central to encouraging further developments in the Gaelic language. We will explore all the implications for the curriculum at all stages to ensure that we are supporting the development of the Gaelic language.
Rhoda Grant mentioned her assiduous work as a learner of Gaelic. I am not a Gaelic speaker, but I have endeavoured to express myself in Gaelic when I have had the opportunity to do so and have felt that to be appropriate. Most recently, I delivered a reasonably significant proportion of my opening address to the Royal National Mòd in Glasgow in Gaelic. A member of the public who was there kindly wrote to me afterwards to express her appreciation of the fact that I had done that, as she knew that I was not a Gaelic speaker. I want to place on record how much I appreciated that encouragement to continue in my work on expressing a proportion of what I am thinking in the Gaelic language. It is a challenging language to learn, but I was deeply touched by the fact that a member of the public took the trouble to write to me to express her support and encouragement. It is crucial that individuals are supported in that way to learn the Gaelic language.
A number of colleagues—Joan McAlpine, Stewart Stevenson, Emma Harper and Peter Chapman—talked extensively about Scots and Doric. The culture of our country is inextricably linked to the Scots language. Just last week, I visited Hill of Beath primary school near Cowdenbeath. The young people from the school come from a community that has a deep tradition of expression in the Scots language. Unlike Mr Chapman’s experience all those years ago—if he may forgive me my choice of words—Hill of Beath primary school is embracing the Scots language. On my visit, I witnessed a tremendous distillation in every single class, from primary 1 to primary 7, of the young people expressing their natural roots and their natural acquisition of their language. As the school recognises, that is helping their attainment and performance, because they are more adept at utilising language as a consequence of the fact that they are being nurtured in the language of their roots. The artistic and cultural expression that came out of that experience was marvellous.
I saw many of those aspirations also reflected at the Scots gaitherin event—to which Joan McAlpine referred—that took place in Glasgow at the end of September, and which I had the good fortune to address. I give a commitment to Emma Harper that I will look carefully at the proposals that have been brought forward to establish a board in relation to the Scots language. The Government looks carefully at all suggestions to advance and develop the native languages of our country.
Scots song, poetry, literature and drama have a strong tradition, and Scots can also be seen to influence more immediate aspects of modern life through television and film, and through the increasing popularity of its expression through social media activities. All those activities and areas need central Government’s support, and I am pleased that, in recent years, we have increased the Scottish Government’s support to a variety of Scots organisations that are supporting the language and opening up access to those who wish to engage and use their mother tongue on a daily basis.
I will cover one last issue before I conclude my remarks. John Finnie referred to the seven benefits of bilingualism, which relates to a very broad point about how the learning of languages facilitates cultural awareness. That foundation of bilingualism enables individuals to make proactive connections and enhance their learning attributes as a consequence. That aspiration lies deep at the heart of the Government’s one-plus-two languages agenda, which is about encouraging multilingualism in our society. Over the past six years, we have provided more than £30 million to local authorities to develop that approach throughout the curriculum in Scottish schools. Those actions to encourage multilingualism complement the work that is being taken forward to enhance and encourage the use of Gaelic and Scots.
There is much to celebrate in the linguistic traditions of our country, but there is also—I am seized of this point—much to do to ensure that we live up to our commitment to our forefathers and mothers by doing all that we can to protect the languages that are part of our identity and history, and which must be part of our future in the years to come.