Reform party messes up Welsh language broadcast
Stephen Price
Reform UK has been accused of having a ‘cavalier attitude’ towards the Welsh language, after running a party political broadcast on Welsh television stations with a mistranslated party slogan.
The Welsh version of Reform’s party political broadcast was shown on Thursday 13 June on both BBC and S4C, using the words ‘Prydain Angen Reform’ which is an inaccurate translation of ‘Britain needs reform.’
The advert, which was shown in English only outside of Wales, has gained widespread media attention for the fact that it was silent, despite running for five minutes.
Your TV isn’t broken, but Britain is.
I hope you enjoy our Party Election Broadcast. pic.twitter.com/VWAqtEszxU
— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) June 13, 2024
It is thought to be the first time in British political history that a party has chosen to use a political broadcast which contained no sound or moving images.
In the Welsh version, however, further controversy has been courted.
Whilst the words ‘Prydain’ and ‘angen’ individually translate to word for word copies of ‘Britain’ and ‘need’, when used together it in fact should have been “Mae angen Reform ar Brydain”.
The broadcast is currently still available on BBC iPlayer and can be found by searching for the term ‘reform S4C’
“Poor”
A number of viewers contacted Nation.Cymru to share their frustration, with one saying: “This does not look particularly respectful of the Welsh people and their language. It also shows a cavalier attitude towards accuracy.”
Adam Jones from Cardiff also said: “The Welsh language is not a Google translate word-switch for English. We have our own structuring and ordering and tense rules that this completely disregards.
“There’s not a Welsh speaking person on earth who would use this – even Google Translate can do better.
“It also struck me that it focuses on Britain’s need for Reform UK but not Wales’. To use such a poor translation in an official party political broadcast speaks volumes.”
Polling
Reform UK has overtaken the Conservatives in a major opinion poll, as Rishi Sunak continues his absence from the General Election campaign trail to meet world leaders in Italy.
A YouGov survey commissioned by the Times newspaper had Nigel Farage’s party at 19% to the Conservatives 18% in voting intention, in a crossover moment which is the latest blow to Tory hopes of returning to government.
Mr Farage hailed the poll, claiming his party were now the “opposition to Labour”, while in Italy the Prime Minister said he was not feeling dejected about his prospects in the election and would be “back on the campaign trail” as soon as he returned from the G7 summit.
In the YouGov poll which revealed the Tory-Reform reversal, Labour remains in the lead at 37% of voting intention, with the Liberal Democrats at 14%, the Greens at 7%, the SNP at 3%, Plaid Cymru at 1% and others at 2%.
It was conducted on a sample size of 2,211 adults in Britain between June 12 and 13.
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Tories & Reform. Two parties hovering around 18%. Fail and fail. The Beavis & Butthead of politics both having proved they do not speak to Cymru. Tell them where to go. Where? Preferably to a Musk launched spacestation way into outer space.
Methinks a one way trip to Mars for members of those two parties.
Hopefully the reason they messed it up is because they couldn’t find a single Welsh speaker who would stoop so low and translate their unionist jingoism. But I somehow doubt that. Plenty of Dic Shon Dafydds around who could have done it.
I’m sure Guto Harri could have helped. He has stooped to working for the bumbling bullsh***ing blonde bloke.
We know what these people think of us in Cymru, as in their previous incarnation, UKIP, a main policy was the abolition of the Barnett formula, so more money could be spent in England and less in the other 3 countries, a figure of several billion £ extra for England was one manifesto pledge in England, at our expense.
No professional translators were employed in the production of this pig’s breakfast.
I’m strangely remind of foreign hotel prospectuses offering a French widow in every room.
They are English Nationalists and couldn’t give two hoots about us.
Vote Plaid Cymru.
It’s a company owned by Farage btw. You’re voting for a private company pretending to be a political party that aims to get Farage rich.
Thinking of voting for them? Be better. Do better. Have a word with yourself.
Farage is already rich. His ‘man of the people’ act is just a sop to the plebs.
Have S4C simply refused to put in on their own catch-up website?
https://www.s4c.cymru/clic/TVSchedule/2024-06-13
It’s there, unfortunately 🙄🙁
UKIP 2: Electric Boogaloo
Their joke of a manifesto mentions Wales once (in the ‘England and Wales’ policing context), makes no mention of Scotland and even England is almost ignored. But Britain is there dozens and dozens of times. It’s hard to ignore the subtext that Reform want all three countries abolished and to complete the Germanic conquering of this entire island. “Vote Reform To Finish What We Started” ?