Progress
has been made in fulfilling the Department of Education's statutory duty
to "encourage and facilitate" Irish medium education. This requirement
is outlined in Article 89 of the Education (Northern Ireland) Order 1998:
(1)
It shall be the duty of the Department (of Education) to encourage
and facilitate the development of Irish-medium education.
-
(2)
The Department may, subject to such conditions as it thinks fit, pay
grants to any body appearing to the Department to have as an objective
the encouragement or promotion of Irish-medium education.
Foras
na Gaeilge, the North/South Language Implementation Body
In response
to the above pledge in paragraph two, the Minister for Education, Martin
McGuinness, announced on 11 February 2000 his intention to establish a development
council for the sector to be known as "Comhairle na Gaelscolaiochta".
This is an advisory body on Irish-medium education. It was formally established
on 20 June 2000 as a limited company. A fund is also to be set up for Irish-medium
education that will operate in a similar way to the Northern Ireland Council
for Integrated Education.
The
Agreement's commitment to more widespread access to Teilifís na Gaeilge
(TG4) within Northern Ireland has been in progress since 1996 when the British
and Irish governments agreed to ensure reciprocal broadcasting of all television
stations throughout the island of Ireland. In a letter issued by the two
governments 5 May 2000, Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern said that technical
discussions would continue on how to extend TG4 throughout Ireland. They
announced that a two-year Irish language TV and film production pilot scheme
would start by April 2001.
