§ Mrs. Bainasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what measures he has taken to encourage the teaching of the Scots language in schools.
§ Mr. McElhone:A report on"Scottish Literature in the Secondary School" which was published in 1976 includes advice to teachers on the use of the Scots language in the secondary school curriculum; discussions have been initiated in primary schools on the questions of accent, dialect and local speech; and a three-year project for the development of Scottish resources in primary, secondary and special schools has recently been established. These initiatives have all been taken by the consultative committee on the curriculum which is the Secretary of State's main advisory body on the school curriculum, but it is for education authorities and head teachers to decide what place the Scots language should be given in the curriculum.