Native speaking Gaelic communities could be lost ‘in this generation’, MPs told

Katrine Bussey, Press Association Scotland Political Editor

Scotland could have no native speaking Gaelic communities “within this generation”, an expert in the language has warned.

While there has been a recent increase in the number of people who can speak Gaelic, Conchúr Ó Giollagáin, Gaelic research professor at the University of the Highlands and Islands, said that was driven by people learning “symbolic Gaelic” as a second language.

The latest census figures showed 130,161 people in Scotland had some Gaelic skills in 2022, an increase of 43,105 from 2011.

But Prof Ó Giollagáin said the “overall trend” is “the social decline of the native speaking communities” in Scotland.

He told the Scottish Affairs Committee that “Gaelic culture in Scotland now is under considerable societal stress”.

In native speaking communities – where Gaelic is the main language – in the Western Isles, the Highlands, and Argyll and Bute, he said the number of people speaking Gaelic every day and using it as their main language is declining.

He told MPs: “If we continue the way we are, without significant strategic change and political support, what we will have soon, within this generation, we will only have second language speakers of Gaelic and no native speaking communities of Gaelic.”

Adding that people in native speaking communities, mainly in the islands, are “not happy with what is happening”, he said: “Nobody wants to see a culture of first language speakers decline, and that is the reality.”

He said a study published in 2020 suggested Scotland had only 11,000 vernacular Gaelic speakers, with this group mostly made up of people aged 50 and above.

Prof Ó Giollagáin added: “What we are seeing on one level is the increase of what we could refer to as symbolic Gaelic, or second language Gaelic, and the continuing decrease of first language, or vernacular, Gaelic.”

Dr Ingeborg Birnie, a senior lecturer at the University of Strathclyde, meanwhile told the committee: “The Gaelic language in Scotland has been an integral part of the country for a very long time, the language and the culture are interwoven with who the Scottish people are.”

However she added: “The language has been in decline for a very long time.”