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Cabinet considers Welsh Language Standards

Published: 14/07/2017

Flintshire County Council’s Cabinet will be asked to approve the progress made in complying with the Welsh Language Standards when it next meets later this month. The report provides an overview of the Welsh Language Annual Report, progress being made to comply with the Standards and identifies areas for improvement. The overall aim of the Standards is to continue and develop the work of previous Welsh Language Schemes. It aims to increase the number of people using Welsh language services and offers guidance to organisations on what they need to meet this aim. The majority of the Standards are consistent with the commitments set out in the Council’s previous Welsh Language Scheme and the Council continues to improve in many areas such as: the implementation of the ‘More than Just Words Framework’ in Social Services which puts them in a positive position to comply with the Standards and deliver bilingual services. By 31 March this year, just over 82% of employees had completed the Welsh language skills audit, compared to 40% at the same time last year. Further initiatives to increase the response rate to the audit will be introduced over the next 12 months. an increased number of employees are attending Welsh language training compared to 2015/16. A small number of complaints relating to Welsh language were investigated by the Commissioner. These relate to issues like misspellings on signs, English only correspondence, not offering an education course in Welsh and time taken to answer Welsh telephone lines. Flintshire County Council Cabinet Member for Corporate Management, Councillor Billy Mullin, said: “Flintshire County Council is committed to working with the Welsh Language Commissioner to ensure that the new standards can be practically achieved, recognising the Council’s geography and demographic breakdown. Although we have had complaints, we continue to liaise with the Commissioner and are working hard to rectify the issues.” “The Council is also developing a five year Welsh Language Promotion Strategy and a policy for Welsh in the workplace to ensure that we raise the profile of the Welsh language to help increase the number of Welsh speakers in the county and for opportunities for employees to use Welsh at work.”