Toby Francis (BBC Radio Sheffield): Well, I mean… these are the reasons people voted for you. Very bold points, as you said. Er, you’re going to cut translation services for non-English speakers - that’s a very bold point. It’s more than likely illegal, isn’t it?
Peter Davies (New English Democrat Mayor of Doncaster): I dunno...again, I’ve got to find this out. It’s-
TF: Well it is - let me tell you it is, under the European Court of Human Rights it’s illegal.
PD: -Well, well, well let… we’ll look into this - we’re getting council’s opinion on what I can do and what I can’t do, and that’s…
TF: No, no, you said in your manifesto you would definitely do it.
...Peter Davies needs to so some fast if he's not going to be a one-term wonder.
6 comments:
So have you. Because it's illegal in France to provide public services in any language other than French. So either it's illegal under European Law, or it isn't. Because it cannot be simultaneoulsy illegal to do something and mandatory to do something.
And seeing as this is a matter of European Law, how can they enforce a ruling against Doncaster without simultaneously also ruling against the whole of France?
Well, in terms of your closing question, Wildgoose, that can be done considering margins of appreciation and the like.
But it would seem to me you are confusing using a national language of the state and providing adequate translation services. The two are not mutually exclusive, and there are certainly translators used by agencies of the French state.
"Because it's illegal in France to provide public services in any language other than French"
DG has already covered this but I'll give just a bit more perosnal background. My wife was involved in a programme which monitored the "new" EU states in a whole range of areas pre their entry in 2004. One of the dependant criterium for entry was the linguistic provision for minorities- so, for example, although Estonian is the state language for Estonia (as English is for the UK), ethnic Russians (theoretically) are entitled to translators when they need to go to court.
Davies should have done the research on this and other promises he's made before jumping in the deep end. I actually do hope he does shake up the Establishment (re the celebration of St George's Day and the like) but he needs to be much more selective on the battlegrounds he chooses to fight on.
The ethnic Russians are still Estonian citizens. The issue here is one of rights and responsibilities. If immigrants demand the right to benefits, health services and the like, paid for by the host community, then it is only fair that they also accept the responsibility to learn English using the freely provided services to do so.
How can there be a community if you can't communicate? The English don't like ghettoes divided off from the rest of society. We've seen enough of where that leads to elsewhere in the UK thank you very much.
And the ridiculous notion that the host community should always have to bend over backwards to accomodate immigrants just leads to the obvious question, Are they immigrants joining our culture or colonists overriding it and parasiting upon it?
The failure to recognise that distinction has now led to the election of 2 BNP MEPs. And the people who will end up suffering most from this backlash will be those immigrants who have made the effort to join our society.
You'd be better off trying to understand why the policy is considered necessary rather than taking the easy knee-jerk holier-than-thou condemnation route.
Councils spending £50m a year translating documents no-one reads.
I think this proves my point.
It proves translation services are expensive and occasionally unnecessary which wasn't in dispute. It's the legal sitaution which the article doesn't cover. Anyroads I'll try to watch the tv programme in question.
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