Ynys Môn MP conducts her first interview in Welsh after learning the language
Ynys Môn MP Virginia Crosbie has conducted her first-ever interview in Welsh after vowing to learn the language on her election in 2019.
Appearing on S4C’s Y Byd yn ei Le, which is presented by former Boris Johnson Spokesman and Director of External Affairs Guto Harri, she spoke about the Sue Gray report in the Welsh language.
Last summer Virginia Crosbie, who grew up in Essex but whose grandfather was a miner in Merthyr Tydfil, passed the Entry Level Welsh for Adults speaking test with a score of 95 per cent. She said that her father also grew up speaking Welsh in Monmouth.
She told y Byd yn ei Le in Welsh that she understood that the people of Ynys Môn were angry about the revelations at Downing Street but said that they were mainly focused on jobs and the development of Wylfa Newydd.
“I was pretty nervous doing the interview but I think I am now just about at the point where I can do it with preparation and a kind interviewer like Guto to help me,” speaking after the interview, she told the North Wales Chronicle.
“I remain far from being able to really talk at length on complicated subjects, but I do feel I am keeping my promise to learn the language and I’m getting there slowly.
“I hope my journey encourages others to learn Welsh too. It takes perseverance – something I have bags of!
“I’m determined to represent my Ynys Môn community by learning the native tongue and keeping our proud culture alive.”
The interview can be watched here at 1 minute 40 seconds.
Support our Nation today
For the price of a cup of coffee a month you can help us create an independent, not-for-profit, national news service for the people of Wales, by the people of Wales.
This is the woman who is getting financial backing from London based companies selling 2nd homes in Ynys Mon thus outpricing people from their own area, right? But she thinks learning Welsh absolves her behaviour towards Wales.
Meanwhile in London her boss has Europe splitting its sides with laughter…stop trying to sanitise this Tory agent…
Stop incomers voting in wales 🏴 and stop all second homes in wales 🏴 it’s time for a new wales 🏴 kick out all English party’s out of wales that’s the Tories Labour and all Brexit party’s stop being little Englanders and and be proud to be welsh
I am a Welsh nationalist but I do not think these infantile xenophobes commenting here will lead to to any extra support to our cause.
Just because I don’t buy into the myth that all Welsh speakers have Wales’ best interests at heart does NOT make me an infantile xenophobe.
O Guto bach caredig, gwas a llyfwr-din bach Boris r’wy ti’n hen siynach bach troedig! Ma’r hen dafod fach ‘na siwr o fod yn brifo ar ôl yr holl lyfu dyddiol!
There’s learning Cymraeg for the love of the language & culture., but I doubt very much that Virginia Crosbie did it because she has respect for Cymraeg or the constituency of Ynys Mon she represents.
Enoch Powell taught himself Welsh … I rest my case.
Let’s be fair on this – she has done well and is an example to her fellow Tory members of the Westminster Parliament who may wish to follow ?
Not all Welsh speakers are good for Wales and worthy advocates for Wales and its people. This was touched on earlier today in the item about David Davies who is becoming more rabid in his stances.
David Davies is very much a one off my friend ( Diolch I Dduw ) you do have a point though to be serious . That great Welshman Emyr Humphrey’s who passed away in I think 2020 at 100 plus had a dad who preached in Welsh on a Sunday and tried to stamp out pupils speaking Welsh in his primary school during the week !
We are truly a strange people as a Slovenian council colleague visiting Wales told me once
Not at all… Shes still a dyed in tne wool tory and unionist!
I think you will find ‘ died in the wool ‘ unionists all over the place mate ! Not just in the Tory Party 🎈…perhaps even 70 per cent of the electorate.
Well done her. Probably it won’t reform her political ideas, but maybe it will raise her appreciation of Welsh culture and that has to be a step in the right direction.
Who knows, maybe she will learn to be happy here after her brief rôle as a Tory MP in Wales ends.
Sylwad gore ‘ma.
Da iawn iddi hi. Political disagreements aside, this is a good advert for the value in learning Welsh – she is reaching an audience that, mostly, will not have heard from her so far. Now vote her out, Ynys Mon.
A tory (with all that encompasses) is a tory in any and every language.
Up until Heath it was morally acceptable albeit mistaken to be a Tory. After that dreadful woman it went beyond the pale.