Kate Forbes: Gaelic cuts risks ripping core out of our communities

At a time of financial constraints, it is imperative that the Government and public-sector organisations take note of such examples and do everything in their power to preserve that funding.

That is why it is so disappointing to hear that Gaelic development officers are to be cut across the board.

As part of a Bòrd na Gàidhlig scheme, these roles were established to support grassroots, community initiatives to protect and enhance Gaelic. And what the roles have achieved, even in the short time the posts have existed, has exceeded the impact of numerous policies, papers and Gaelic plans.

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That’s largely because the individuals in these posts have consistently gone beyond the call of duty, with a calling to serve some of the most rural, under-served communities in Scotland. I know some of the current officers and their creativity, commitment and determination to deliver meaningful change for their communities cannot be faulted.

In fact, I’d previously reflected that if we could clone some of these officers and established development officer posts in other communities, then it would be worth its weight in gold.

But that was before the news broke this week that Bòrd na Gàidhlig will be scrapping the scheme. And in response, I’ve rarely seen or heard such an outpouring of anger and frustration, including from people who’ve never complained about anything in their lives before.

My inbox is full of emails asking for this decision to be reversed, and social media is awash with people expressing regret and alarm at the decision.

It might be hard for some to understand why this news would elicit such an outpouring of anger. So much of the public sector is under financial pressure – so why should this news strike a chord? What about hospitals, or roads, or schools? Well, all of that is critical, of course.

But there is something about Gaelic community work that cuts across all the usual divides of politics, constitution and background in the communities where it is still heard and spoken on a daily basis. And this decision, to shave a few hundred thousand pounds, seems counter-productive in the extreme.

For starters, everybody knows that community is where language lives or dies. Yes, the classroom can preserve the language of academia to an extent. Even Latin and Ancient Greek live on in institutions of learning. But they are not living languages.

Even fluent learners are unlikely to use either language as part of their daily lives. That is why education policy alone and Gaelic Medium Education is only one part of the solution. If it is the only solution, then Gaelic will go the same way – technically relevant, but only technically. Relevant for anybody wishing to pass an exam or achieve a qualification and soon forgotten once the school day is out.

If our sole aim is to protect Gaelic as the language of the classroom, then we have already given up.

Our vision should be so much more ambitious – to protect Gaelic as a living, breathing language of community. As it is just now. Today, in Staffin or Ness, local residents will default to their mother tongue as they command the sheep dog or wish a passer-by “good morning” or tell their children to get ready. That is happening in households and in communities right now. And to develop and nurture that, we need to focus on the community.

Everybody knows that community work cannot be top-down, it needs to be bottom-up. Big institutions cannot do that well, only people can connect with other people. Individuals can build relationships, listen, find ways of supporting new initiatives. And in busy communities, so often that is exactly what makes the biggest difference. Somebody who believes in the community and the cause can make change happen. That’s what Gaelic community workers are doing.

Secondly, the communities benefiting from Gaelic development officers have been starved of support for centuries. Think about it. The decline of the language has gone hand-in-hand with depopulation, under-investment in infrastructure and distortion of the local economy. Language doesn’t exist in a vacuum – it’s about speakers.

Language declines when people leave or are forced to adapt to new cultures, traditions and ways of life. That is precisely what has happened in the Gaelic heartlands. There is a direct link between the pressing demographic challenges in our islands or along our coast and the decline of the Gaelic language.

To reverse the trend, you have to show respect to these communities by listening to their priorities. That is why I first commissioned the socio-economic study into Gaelic.

It revealed that housing, transport, infrastructure and land reform are just as important as language policies, if not more important. If a young Gaelic speaker can stay in the community, find meaningful, well-paid work locally and then raise their own family, they are breaking the cycle of the past few generations.

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It’s too much to expect Bòrd na Gàidhlig to achieve all of that – it doesn’t provide housing or engage in economic development. But the community development workers are flexible enough to support all the varied ways to support Gaelic in a particular community. They can listen, act, change tack and adapt – in a way that an institution cannot. They should be the Government’s eyes and ears on the ground, able to feed back as to what truly is a community’s priority. Removing them puts all of that at risk.

Lastly and thirdly, it has been reported that the development workers are being cut despite Bòrd na Gàidhlig’s core funding remaining the same in cash terms as last year – because the officers were funded out of extra resources rather than core funding. If anything should be core funding, it should be community work. Other initiatives may come and go, but the community work should be protected and should be treated as “core”. And the backlash from people the length and breadth of my constituency will hopefully encourage a rethink.

Gaelic is one of Scotland’s languages. If we don’t care about it, nobody else will.

For me, it’s not just about our history and our heritage. It’s about community. It’s about family. It’s about the future of our islands, our coastal areas and the mainland. It’s about people. And the community development workers are about all of that. legislation is important but dry. Policy documents can make a difference but they aren’t living.

In sharp contrast, community workers are living, breathing, hope-filled optimists that a better future is possible. I hope we find a way to continue supporting them.