Stormont has spent two decades arguing over Irish language legislation. A language and identity Act was eventually passed in 2022 and the final milestone in its implementation was reached last week, when the Sinn Féin and DUP first ministers appointed the commissioners and other office-holders the Act requires. Appointees will take up their posts from next week and the complicated system everyone has been inching towards for years should crank into operation. Only then will it become apparent if it causes more problems than it solves.
The system is a classic Northern Ireland compromise – a three-legged stool, not unlike the three strands of the Belfast Agreement. There is an Irish language commissioner, an Ulster Scots commissioner and an office of identity and cultural expression somewhere between and above them both.
The Irish language commissioner is Pól Deeds, currently the deputy chief executive of Foras na Gaeilge. His main task will be to produce best-practice standards for public authorities on how to provide their services in Irish. He will also monitor compliance and investigate complaints.
The Ulster Scots commissioner is Lee Reynolds, a former DUP senior adviser. Because Ulster Scots is hardly a counterpart to Irish, to put it kindly, the post’s full title is the commissioner for the Ulster Scots and the Ulster British tradition, and its remit covers language, arts and literature. The commissioner will not produce standards for public authorities but will advise, support and guide them on “developing and encouraging the relevant language, arts and literature”.
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Lee has said Irish and Ulster Scots are not “mirror images” requiring the same approach. For political purposes, however, they do need to be two objects of roughly equal weight.
The office of identity and cultural expression has a director, Dr Katy Radford, and five board members, from a mix of professional backgrounds.
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Its main role is to advise public authorities on a new duty to uphold “national and cultural identity principles” while respecting the “sensitivities” of others.
What that seems to mean is finding ways to acknowledge Britishness and Irishness without stepping on each other’s toes.
The Act’s elaborate arrangements have been scrutinised by stakeholders, experts and activists. Two broad criticisms have emerged. The first is unease with the wide, woolly remits of the Ulster Scots commissioner and the office of identity and cultural expression. Both diverge from legal convention on protecting minority languages, by treating Ulster Scots and Irish as cultural projects from separate ethno-political groups.
But if that is what it takes to balance a deal, so be it. It is only reflecting reality.
The second, more serious criticism of the new system is that nothing about it is compulsory and everything has to be cleared by the first ministers, giving each of their parties a veto. Foot-dragging has already begun. An unexplained delay of several months in appointing the commissioners was widely blamed on the DUP.
The Act looks like another instance of the DUP outwitting Sinn Féin in negotiations, securing a veto on republican advancement. Such victories are hollow as they humiliate Sinn Féin to the point where its base demands it push back
The Irish language commissioner’s best-practice standards are seen as the meatiest aspect of the Act, yet even they must be approved by the first ministers, while public authorities must only show the standards “due regard”.
Sinn Féin and the DUP have been arguing since last year over bilingual signs at Belfast’s new Grand Central Station. The Irish language commissioner could not impose a resolution to this row. In fact, he could not even propose a station standard for the DUP to veto. Northern Ireland’s public transport company is not on the list of public bodies covered by the Act and only the first ministers can amend the list.
The Act’s safeguard against obstruction is empowering the secretary of state to step in and exercise any of its functions. This is unorthodox – the usual safeguard is to have independent commissioners.
It also has obvious flaws. British ministers rarely want to step in: they prefer to give Stormont parties time to reach a deal. So lengthy deadlocks between Sinn Féin and the DUP appear inevitable. Both parties may even be encouraged to stall, one by knowing the secretary of state will intervene, the other by knowing intervention is a last resort.
Such intervention will only freeze arguments, not resolve them. The DUP and Sinn Féin hate being overruled by British ministers. Sinn Féin also resents having to depend on British intervention.
The Act looks like another instance of the DUP outwitting Sinn Féin in negotiations, securing a veto on republican advancement. Such victories are hollow as they humiliate Sinn Féin to the point where its base demands it push back.
The collapse of Stormont in 2017 began over the renewable heat incentive but it was dragged out for three years largely because Sinn Féin had been outmanoeuvred by a previous deal to pass Irish language legislation. If history is not to repeat itself, the new system will have to be managed with extraordinary care.
