Anne McLaughlin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anne McLaughlin on 2016-01-14.

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to the UK’s ratification of the European Charter for Minority or Regional Languages, what steps the Government is taking to facilitate and promote use of the Gaelic language in reserved agencies and policy areas.

Mr Edward Vaizey

Whilst there is currently no UK legislative requirement for Gaelic language broadcasting to be funded by the Exchequer, some of the UK Government’s commitments under Article 11 of the European Charter for Regional or Minority languages are fulfilled by BBC Alba’s content, in tandem with the Gaelic radio service provided by the BBC, Radio nan Gaidheal. MG ALBA is a public body, set up by UK legislation and funded predominantly by the Scottish Government. In addition, two one-off funding allocations of £1 million were provided for MG ABLA for the period 2014-16.

MG ALBA’s principal functions relate to the provision of Gaelic programmes. It works in partnership with the BBC to operate the channel, BBC ALBA. Scotland continues to enjoy the live stream from BBC ALBA and programmes are available on the BBC website via iPlayer for the rest of the UK.