LL-L "Language politics" 2011.07.06 (02) [EN-NL]

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 L O W L A N D S - L - 06 July 2011 - Volume 02
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From: Roger Thijs, Euro-Support, Inc. roger.thijs at euro-support.be
Subject: LL-L Language poficiency

The Dutch Railways get fines because they allow Belgan trains operated by
monolingual walloon engineers on the Dutch rail network.
It concerns the short connection Liège-Maastricht, crossing the border.
Apparently (some) walloon operators do not speak/understand Dutch and create
a safety risk on the Dutch network.
With German operators they do not have a similar problem.
(They can always communicate in Limburgish or a Low German variant I guess)
Cf. article from “De Standaard” annexed below.
Regards,
Roger

Waalse machinisten leveren Nederlandse Spoorwegen boetes op
woensdag 06 juli 2011, 10u02Bron: anp Auteur: hrt

De Nederlandse Spoorwegen kreeg dit jaar twee boetes opgelegd, omdat
Franstalige Belgische machinisten op de lijn Luik-Maastricht geen Nederlands
bleken te spreken.
Dat leidt volgens de Inspectie Verkeer en Waterstaat tot gevaarlijke
situaties, omdat de Franstalige machinisten geen normaal gesprek kunnen
voeren met de Nederlandse treindienstleiding.

De IVW kondigt voor dit jaar meer controles aan.

Al in 2006 legde de IVW een dwangsom op vanwege de Franstalige machinisten,
en de Nederlandse Spoorwegen beloofde toen beterschap. Controles eind vorig
jaar leerden dat de Franstalige machinisten nog steeds geen Nederlands
spraken.

De hoogte van de boete is gelijk aan de kosten van een extra persoon in de
cabine die de taal wel kan spreken. De boetes werden dit voorjaar geïnd.

Duitse machinisten die op Nederland rijden, kennen hun talen volgens de
inspectie wel.

Source:
http://www.standaard.be/artikel/detail.aspx?artikelid=DMF20110706_026

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language politics

Thanks, dear Roger, as always.

I simply don't understand why Belgium does not introduce Dutch and French
bilingualism as mandatory in all schools. In this model, primarily
Dutch-speaking students would be required to study French and English as
foreign languages, and primarily French-speaking students would  be required
to study  Dutch and English as foreign languages. This would be similar to
the Finnish education model, where everyone learns both Finnish and Swedish,
aside from English as a foreign language. What's so hard about this concept?


You, Roger, are a shining example of a Belgian in this regard: your native
language is Limburgish, and you are fully proficient in Dutch and French,
aside from knowing German and English well. OK ... so this may be a bit
intimidating to the average Jan/Jean. But studying Dutch and French from
childhood (even if your native language is Limburgish, Luxemburgish,
Ripuarian, Walloon, Picard ...) shouldn't be that big of a deal. Am I being
naive?

Aside from this, I would love to see schools in Lower Saxony and North-Rhine
Westphalia (if not also in other North German states) to promote Dutch as a
more prominent foreign language. I could see this having several benefits,
such as closer neighborly ties, and greater employment chances for German
youth. Aside from this, it might well help rekindle the old Lowlands flame:
awareness of a Dutch-Saxon continuum, resulting in renewed interest in the
linguistic and cultural continuum.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
Seattle, USA

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