Editorial: So-called Ulster-Scots strategy plans just divert gaze from the forcing of Irish

​​An Irish language commissioner has not even been appointed and already the problems with an Irish language act are emerging. The Department of Communities plans to release its ‘Irish Language Strategy’ and ‘Ulster-Scots Language, Heritage and Culture Strategy’ within months.

Already the department has convened 'experts' who said half a million people in Northern Ireland, a country with a population of 1.9 million, should "have knowledge of Irish" within 20 years. Why? Irish is spoken by a tiny number of people in the province. If this is pointed out Irish language extremists typically contradict themselves. On the one hand they say that Irish is already widely known, which they can only claim by casting around for statistics that include people who have a minor acquaintance with the language. On the other they say low Irish uptake is due to denial of rights. In fact public money has been pumped at Irish, which is apparently so important to nationalists yet is not something many seem to learn.

Worse than that goal is the aspiration that "10% of the wider school population" be enrolled in Irish-language schools by 2042. You would expect the political centre ground and supporters of integrated education to be appalled by such a goal, which will move us into even greater school segregation. But there is no such criticism because republicans have made forcing of Irish seem like inclusion.

While it is understandable that unionists talked up Ulster Scots to try to combat the proliferation of forced Gaelic, it was a mistake even so. The extreme goals for Irish can seem balanced because the experts want three new Ulster-Scots bodies. Most people who consider themselves British or Northern Irish have no interest in Ulster-Scots, so there is no need for a "language institution". It will divert the gaze from forced Gaelic.