Letter: Sympathy for residents over Irish-language sign row at Olympia Leisure Centre

At a recent meeting in the Olympia Leisure Centre, Belfast, local residents voiced opposition to the erection of Irish-language signs in the building. As a senior member of the city’s Irish-language community, I have some sympathy with their stance.

It is obvious that a number of issues need to be addressed before any plan to erect signage in a language other than English can be contemplated. The rationale behind such a plan would need to be sensitively explained to the local community over time. That would involve a long-term community education programme followed by a community-wide debate which might lead to some form of informed consent about what signage might, or might not, be acceptable.

As an Irish speaker, I find some of the Irish-language signs which have been erected already at Andersonstown Leisure Centre to be incomprehensible. Therefore, I would not be in favour of the same signs being erected elsewhere.

If Belfast City Council can erect Irish-language signs which Irish speakers cannot understand, it is entering dangerous territory. I made the council aware of this in September 2020. I explained that, in regard to the Andersonstown signs, the council had to decide either to: 1. superimpose intelligible Irish text on the incomprehensible signs; or 2. leave the incomprehensible signs exactly as they were.

I pointed out the first option would cost money and anger citizens who might be hostile towards the Irish language. I then said that the second option would be equally problematic for three reasons: 1. the city council would be accused of treating the Irish-language community as second class citizens; 2. the decision to retain the incomprehensible signs would establish a precedent for the erection of yet more unintelligible Irish-language signage on council property in the future; and 3. the existence of incomprehensible Irish signs on council property would subordinate the use of meaningful Irish on council property to the emblematic use of the language which would be politically dangerous.

The danger would arise, I said, if the council appeared to be acting in the interests of nationalists who supported the emblematic use of Irish as a weapon against the unionist community for political purposes.

I emphasised the fact that official support for Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Welsh hinged on a consensus that these languages had a purely civic identity and that, if that were not the case, the governments of NI, Scotland and Wales could be accused of subsidising political rather than cultural activity. The council, I argued, should adopt the official approach. In the following months, council officers addressed the issues I raised through a series of avoidance strategies which culminated in a decision that the incomprehensible signs were, in fact, comprehensible, yet they produced no credible evidence in support of that position. To me the signs in question still remain incomprehensible.

As I understand it, the city council, by supporting the current use of incomprehensible Irish-language signs on its property, continues to make the emblematic use of the Irish language possible. That can only harm the city’s Irish-language community and justify the opposition voiced at the Olympia meeting.

Liam Andrews, BT11