§ Mrs. Dunwoodyasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science (1) why Irish children resident in the United Kingdom are not to be permitted to learn their mother tongue and cultural background and children from Italy are to be offered these facilities in British schools;
(2) what guidance she is preparing for the use of local educational authorities who will be required to extend their curricula to include the teaching of Danish, Italian, Dutch, German and Vlaams as well as French in order to comply with the EEC directive on the education of immigrant children.
§ Miss Margaret JacksonThe directive covers only the children of EEC nationals employed in EEC countries, but the member States have agreed that the measures called for in the directive should also apply to other migrant workers' children whose educational needs are the same. There is, therefore, no question in practice of discriminating between children on grounds of nationality and children of migrant workers of the Republic of Ireland will enjoy the same rights as those from Italy. When the directive was discussed it was made plain that it did not confer any individual entitlement to tuition in school in the mother tongue and culture, and no substantial expansion of provision of this kind in the schools can be expected in present circumstances. In deciding what measures to promote the teaching of the mother tongue and culture are suited to their particular systems of 13W education and national circumstances, member States are also entitled to take into account the possibility of obtaining the co-operation of the countries of origin of the children concerned.
The official text of the directive is not yet available and meanwhile my right hon. Friends are considering what guidance should be offered to local education authorities on its implementation in the United Kingdom.
§ Mrs. Dunwoodyasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what increase in funds she proposes to offer local education authorities to allow them to comply with the terms of the EEC directive on the education of immigrant children in the language of their mother tongue.
§ Miss Margaret JacksonNone. In present economic circumstances we do not expect the adoption of the directive to lead to any substantial increase in expenditure by local education authorities on provision of this kind. Within the limits of the funds already available my right hon. Friend is prepared to consider assisting research and development projects likely to yield useful information on this aspect of languages.