The Equality Officer presented a report, that updated the Cabinet Equalities Committee on the implementation of the Welsh language (Wales) Measure 2011 and the Welsh Language Standards.

He confirmed that following receipt of its final compliance notice on 30 September 2015, the Council has been working to determine the implications involved in implementing all 171 standards by 30 September 2016.

The Equality Officer explained that the Council has continued to prepare for compliance with the standards, and the key updates/progress made since 28 April 2016 regarding these (the date when the Committee were last updated on this item), were summarised in paragraph 4.1 of the report. He then gave a resume of each of these for the benefit of Members.

The report attached the following supporting information:-

• The Action Plan themes;
• The Standards under appeal (March 2016); and
• The Standards being funded corporately

A Member raised some concerns with regards to the report’s financial implications, and the pressure that will be placed upon the Authority to fund all of the Standards, which would place a huge amount of pressure on its already dwindling resources. She asked if the shortfall would be met by Welsh Government to which the Equality Officer confirmed that they would not be funding any such shortfall.

The Chairperson added that some of the Standards were being appealed against, however, if the appeals failed, the Authority would still have to comply with the Standards as, if it failed to do this, it could be fined by Welsh Government.

The Equality Officer confirmed that monies had been set aside under the MTFS to fund some of the Standards.

The Chairperson further added that some services the Council had to provide bi-lingualy may be reduced or possibly stopped altogether in future, dependent upon the outcome of the appeals and the resulting cost to the Authority. 

The Chairperson then introduced Amanda Evans from Menter Bro Ogwr to give a submission entitled Welsh Language Profile 2016.

She confirmed that Bridgend had 13,103 welsh speakers, which amounted to 9.7% of its population. According to the Mentrau Iath’s language profile, 31% of these individuals spoke welsh every day.

She confirmed that the vision of Menter Bro Ogwr, was to increase confidence and linguistic skills of welsh speakers; promote and facilitate social activities through the medium of welsh, encourage non-welsh speakers and incomers to learn the welsh language, and promote the use of welsh in business.

Menter Bro Ogwr also wished to increase the use of welsh in voluntary organisations, influence public bodies’ policies, raise the profile of the language, and finally prepare opportunities for children and young people to meet and socialise through the welsh language.

Ms. Evans added that by focusing on these areas, the Menter encompasses the Welsh Government’s main priorities in terms of the language, and the areas of responsibility falling to BCBC under its promotion duties, for example, families, children and young people, the community and the workplace.

She confirmed that Menter Bro Ogwr had issued a questionnaire in the South Wales area, to which 733 people responded. Of these responses, 15% (109) were from the Bridgend area.. She advised that it needed to be borne in mind, that those who responded were not necessarily representative of all welsh speakers in the area.

Ms. Evans further added that only 2 of the 109 responses noted that welsh was not part of their everyday life, with the majority, (67 or 61%) noting ‘most of the time’. 49% responded that they used the welsh language in their homes, 50% that they used welsh language at school, college or university.

She explained that awareness of the welsh language needed to be raised, as there were daily barriers that sometimes prohibited this. She felt also, that not enough people admitted that they spoke welsh, nor were there enough signs indicating that they did.

In conclusion therefore, Ms. Evans confirmed that the profile had brought together:-

·         Key statistics of Welsh speakers in the area;

·         The main statutory requirements relevant to the Menter’s key partners;

·         A number of research findings on Welsh language patterns of use by Welsh speakers in the area; and

·         The results of the survey held as part of this work that highlights the experiences of Welsh speakers and learners in the area

The key messages that emerged from the experiences of welsh speakers, together with the formal data, also highlighted a number of areas that need to be addressed. For example:-

1.    the need for more opportunities for young people to use Welsh outside school and after leaving school (from leisure to the workplace);

2.    the need for more experiences to increase the confidence and use of the language amongst learners, and those Welsh speakers with little or no confidence to use their Welsh in new situations;

3.    the need for employers to recognise the value of the language for their workplaces, ensuring support for Welsh speakers;

4.    the need to ensure that the language is more prominent in the community, in order to promote wider use, both through the spoken word and visually

The Chairperson thanked Ms. Evans for her presentation, following which, the Committee

RESOLVED:                        That the Cabinet Equalities Committee received and considered the report, and accompanying Presentation from the representative of  Menter Bro Ogwr.