Human rights watchdog calls for more teachers to meet rising demand for Welsh language education

Luke James

Experts from Europe’s human rights watchdog have called for immediate action to ensure that there are enough teachers to meet the rising demand for Welsh language education.

A shortage of teachers is the main concern raised about the health of the Welsh language in a report published today by the Council of Europe as part of its investigation into whether the UK is complying with the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

“The evidence that we received was that there is strong growth in Welsh medium education and teaching of Welsh as a language but that there were problems in teacher recruitment and training and this ultimately is a limiting factor on the continued expansion,” Rob Dunbar, one of the Council’s experts, told Nation.Cymru.

“The main recommendation for immediate action was to ensure the long term adequate training of teachers so that demand for Welsh-medium education is met in the future.

“I think it’s not only responding to that demand but planning to ensure that as demand continues to increase that the availability of teachers continues to increase as well.”

The number of teachers with the ability to work through Welsh has fallen slightly in recent years, according to data from the Education Workforce Council. Of 35,865 qualified teachers in Wales, 9,504 (26.5%) can work in Welsh compared to 9,550 (27.2%) in 2020.

Support staff

The shortage is worse when it comes to school support staff, 20.3% of whom can work in Welsh, and further education staff, 12.8% of whom can teach in Welsh.

That has been cited as the reason for slow growth in the number of children in Welsh medium education, which has increased modestly – from 19.1% to 22.5% in primary schools and from 12.9% to 13.5% in secondary schools – over the past two decades.

Mererid Lewis Davies, the deputy general secretary of teaching union UCAC, said schools were finding it particularly difficult to recruit maths, science, and even Welsh language teachers.

“In certain subjects, schools are unable to appoint,” she said. “Not only in rural areas but also in cities like Cardiff. Schools are advertising a few times before they can fill a position or are sometimes still unsuccessful.

“Teachers end up covering subjects that they might not even have an A level in because schools can’t recruit in these positions. Schools also depend on support assistants and finding support assistants who speak Welsh can be a huge issue.

“Until there’s more Welsh used in the English medium system we’re not going to be in a position to increase the number of teachers – that’s why it is essential that the provisions of the new Welsh in Education Bill are met fully, through which schools will have to ensure that each young person in Wales is bilingual.”

S4C repeats

The report also calls for action to address the shortage of Welsh-speaking staff in health services, particularly in mental health care and elderly care homes, and highlighted the increasing number of repeats on S4C due to funding cuts.

As part of the Council’s investigation, its experts travelled to Caernarfon to hear evidence from groups including Cymdeithas yr Iaith.

“We were glad to be a part of the discussions and the research that led to the publication of this report,” said Joseff Gnagbo,chair of Cymdeithas yr Iaith, “and are pleased that much of our input has been translated into specific, actionable points which can be fulfilled by the Welsh and British Governments.”

“It is clear that if Welsh is to survive as a living language, and if everyone in Wales’ right to live through the medium of Welsh is to be secured, radical change is needed in several policy fields including education, media, and our legal rights to use our language. It is now the government’s responsibility to carry out those changes.”

In 2022, the Welsh Goverment published strategies on how to overcome the shortages in Welsh-speaking staff in the education and health sectors.

A grant of up to £5,000 has been made available to people who train to teach through the medium of Welsh in an effort to tackle the shortage.

Strong relationship

A Welsh Government spokesperson said: “We have a strong relationship with the Committee of Experts and welcome the report and its findings, which confirm we continue to be in a good position to deliver the articles referenced in the Charter. They reinforce our vision to double daily language use and reach a million Welsh speakers by 2050.

“The evidence used was submitted over a year ago and we have since taken significant strides on our journey to deliver Cymraeg 2050, such as the introduction of the Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill in July.”

The UK Government, as the signatory to the charter, will have to respond to the recommendations for immediate action in today’s report.

Across the UK, the Council of Europe’s experts said that there is a “good framework for protecting regional or minority languages” but added there is an “over-reliance on volunteers for the development of some languages – notably Cornish, Scots and Ulster Scots – and a lack of adequate and systematic funding.”

“We know that promoting minority languages is not just a matter for governments, that communities have an important role to play,” added Rob Dunbar, the chair of Celtic language studies at the University of Edinburgh.

“But where there’s an offloading of responsibility by the state onto the volunteer sector, that becomes an issue.

“We didn’t find that it was particularly an issue in Wales but in Cornwall in particular, where there’s still very limited funding, much of the efforts to promote the language through things like night school classes are very heavily dependent on volunteer efforts. A better framework and more funding is important to support the work of the voluntary sector.”

Tolerance

The experts also called for the UK Government to promote awareness of minority languages and tolerance towards people who speak them “within the English-speaking majority.”

“We have to remember that the UK is the signatory to the treaty and in the first instance the responsibility for implementing the treaty is with the UK Government,” added Dunbar, who is himself a Scottish Gaelic speaker and Welsh learner.

“One of the aims of the charter is to support a better understanding of minority languages across the state, not just in Wales or Scotland and Ireland. But in England as well.

“We have sought to highlight that this is something that needs to be considered by the UK authorities.”