This question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office made me snigger.
Mrs. Gillan: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many Welsh speakers his Department employs.
Meg Munn: The Foreign and Commonwealth Office recruits its UK-based staff from all parts of the UK. Our records do not show whether staff are able to speak Welsh.
Mainly because I read it after I had read this one.
Mrs. Gillan: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many Welsh speakers his Department employs.
Mr. Bob Ainsworth: The Ministry of Defence employs 171 people who have declared themselves as Welsh speakers. The declaration is voluntary, so there may be members of staff who do speak Welsh but have not declared themselves as Welsh speakers.
You'd think that that knowing what languages someone working at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office might speak would be something quite fundamental to record wouldn't you? Perhaps they do record it but they just hate the Taffs?
7 comments:
Yes - but no foreigners speak Welsh ( except a few lost in Argentina somewhere ).
Why the Government would promote a language that damages social cohesion and economic prospects is beyond me. But then I'm not Welsh.
Dear Dizzy
This Government seems to have great partiality for interfering in other Country's affairs, however remote from UK defence needs
* This "justifies" the employment of so many Colonels/Brigadiers/Generals and Captains/Admirals at inflated salaries and pensions
* It is also to "impress" the Americans that Britain is a World-Power, as if the Americans care
but Am I now right to worry ???
Why should there be a need for Welsh-speakers in the MoD
- surely they cannot be contemplating (even with benefit of mendacious Dodgy Dossiers) the despatch of yet another Expeditionary Force, this time to Wales
AND how much have these PMQs (Parliamentary Questions) cost the Taxpayer
Yr obedient servant etc
G Eagle
They've got to suss out what nationality they are before worrying about languages.
Speaking of which, since installing that anonymity software the titles on this interface are in German , which nicht es sehr gut , or something like that....
Is Wales going to declare UDI? Is there going to be a need for an embassy in Cardiff (or wherever they establish their capital?) requiring local language speakers? And anyway, didn't the FCO recently outsource its language training school? Good for total immersion if it is located across that infernal windy bridge.
Yes - but no foreigners speak Welsh ( except a few lost in Argentina somewhere ).
Really, you know every Welsh speaker then? Oddly enough, I was met a Canadian and an American today and both spoke Welsh, I know of plenty more as well.
Why the Government would promote a language that damages social cohesion and economic prospects is beyond me.
Can someone remind me if it's 2007 or 1857? Someone got some very old fashioned ideas
To be fair, though some foreigners might speak Welsh, it isn't the official language of any country except Wales. Interesting that teh MOD has a different practise though- getting a declaration. I wonder if because the FCO is separate in part from teh civil service central departments there is a different policy.
But if you were a 'foreigner' and wanted to move to Wales, you might decide to learn Welsh (yes, people do this, and not just from English speaking countries) and sit your citizenship test in Welsh, so it reasonable to have some staff at the foreign office that are able to speak Welsh.
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