So the Welsh MP who refused to talk in English

[Beetroot]

On the BBC news?

WHY?

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so he talk in Welsh and noone listens because they are all thinking - why not just talk in the language that most of the people listening to will understand

weird

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missed that, odd

and we cannot hear him talking in Welsh becasue there is a bloke translating over his voice

next time I am intervied I am going to refuse to speak in Emglish - I will only speak in aborignie

Cod, this isn't the first time you have been rude about the Welsh and the Welsh language, so I knew you'd be on this thread.

I'll wait for Moondog to explain things, as I think she'll put it better than me.

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Cerys if you are a welsh speaker perhaps (ss moondog is not around) you get explain

Was he talking about welsh issues to welsh people? if so then why would anyone else want to know what he's talking about?
further that - he's a welsh poliitian so why would anyone want toknow what he's talking about?

Have you got a link to the full story?

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I'm not a fluent Welsh speaker, but at the moment I think I am too at the "made up language" and BIG CON comments to make much sense.

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I once went to a meeting with The Welsh Language Board who are militant pro-Welsh campaigners who get public funding. The meeting was on a medical sunject. The Welsh Language Board were stumped by medical and kept having to revert to English. Yet the argument they were making was that all doctors in Wales must speak Welsh. It was at that point I decided all campaigners for Welsh must always be ignored at all costs.

No i have not I heard in BBC news

BUT as the bloke only spoke in Welsh I didn't listen to his name or waht he said..as I jsut thought WHY?

It seems a bit .....pointless. How many welsh speakers are there I wonder. It's great to keep the language alive ....but....

He should be allowed to speak in welsh if he wants to!!

However, if its to people who will mostly understand English it probably would have been better if he's spoken in English.

The reason the welsh language is dying is bcos there is no-one who insists it is spoken in. I'm not a welsh speaker cos I lived on the border and went to an english school where I had a choice of learning French or German

Why shouldn't he speak in Welsh?!! A Welsh person speaking Welsh - well, whatever next?!!

www.omniglot.com/writing/welsh.htm - oh here we are.

Putting my 'reasonable' hat on (that particular hat has cobwebs on it) I think it is just fine and dandy that he spoke welsh, think the tv channel is at fault for not providing sub titles

why is using your own language pointless?

I can't speak welsh, in part this is due to my inability to learn any language and partly because my father, while being Welsh, only spoke English.

The reason Dad didn't speak Welsh was that his mother and father had both been beaten in school for having been caught speaking Welsh.

The school had a board on a rope that was hung around the neck. The first child caught using welsh would have it hung around their neck. The Child was encouraged to snitch on other childern who spoke in Welsh and the board would be passed on, one to another. Whoever was wearing it at the eand of the day was beaten.

Wow MB, that sounds vile. Where was this?

i am happy that after so many years of facing a decline the Welsh language is being used more often - it is heartening to imagine debates in Welsh in the Welsh Assembly!

I am not Welsh but am a firm supporter of minority language rights. A people's right to use their language is v important.

Given that translation was available, I don't see how this could be more irritating than if an Italian politician had spoken in Italian.

In the Rhondda in the late 19th Century.

My grandfather first crops up in the census records as speaking welsh and english. By the time he was working as a miner at the age of 12 he is listed as only speaking English.

He told dad about he board, who told me.