<div dir="ltr"><h1 class="gmail-story-body__h1">Welsh government challenges own language standards</h1>
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<ul class="gmail-mini-info-list"><li class="gmail-mini-info-list__item"> <div class="gmail-date gmail-date--v2">23 February 2016</div>
</li><li class="gmail-mini-info-list__item"><span class="gmail-mini-info-list__section-desc gmail-off-screen">From the section </span><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/wales/wales_politics" class="gmail-mini-info-list__section">Wales politics</a></li></ul>
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</span></figure></div><p class="gmail-story-body__introduction">The Welsh government is contesting its own policy on Welsh language services provision.</p><p>It is applying to challenge two of 164 rules which give rights for the public and government workers to use Welsh.</p><p>One says it must provide documents for public use in Welsh and the other to make Welsh oral announcements.</p><p>The
government said it was "fully committed" to delivering standards and
had issued the challenge after considering their implications.</p><p>The
rules, due to be imposed on Welsh ministers from March 2016, were
written by civil servants and passed by the assembly two years ago.</p><p>Campaigners
from Welsh language society Cymdeithas yr Iaith said they were
concerned the challenge would weaken people's right to Welsh, and it was
"a matter of great embarrassment" for the government to challenge rules
it wrote and tabled itself.</p><p>Welsh Language Commissioner Meri Huws
will now consider the challenge, but said she could not comment while
the process was under way.</p><p>Manon Elin, chairwoman of Cymdeithas yr
Iaith, said: "If the government is not ready to meet people's basic
rights to Welsh, who is?</p><p>"We'll be opposing these applications to
weaken people's rights to Welsh, and we'll consider using our rights to
intervene legally against the Welsh Government and other bodies. We will
stand up for people in order to secure their human rights, their rights
to Welsh." </p><p><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-politics-35640481">http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-politics-35640481</a><br></p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature">**************************************<br>N.b.: Listing on the lgpolicy-list is merely intended as a service to its members<br>and implies neither approval, confirmation nor agreement by the owner or sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a message's contents. Members who disagree with a message are encouraged to post a rebuttal, and to write directly to the original sender of any offensive message. A copy of this may be forwarded to this list as well. (H. Schiffman, Moderator)<br><br>For more information about the lgpolicy-list, go to <a href="https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/" target="_blank">https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/</a><br>listinfo/lgpolicy-list<br>*******************************************</div>
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