mr president as a member of the european parliament for wales i have a lot of sympathy for the many minority languages across europe particularly as my mother tongue is welsh one of the oldest european languages still in use
numerically the situation of hungarian speakers in slovakia is very similar to that of welsh speakers in wales in excess of half a million individuals
this equates however to twenty of the people in wales but less than two of the uk population
after many hundreds of years of pushing and pulling between english- and welsh-speakers in wales and arguments very similar to those now between slovak and hungarian speakers today a happy coexistence has been achieved in wales
the revival of the welsh language over the past fifteen years since devolution has been meteoric
the positive attitude to the language has had huge cultural benefits
in wales the key has been to take a pragmatic approach
we should aim for people to be able to speak in whatever language they feel most comfortable in but without causing undue burden or cost
for example i intend to finish my comments in welsh although i would not want to incur the cost to taxpayers of simultaneous translation here in parliament for the benefit of just two welsh-speaking meps
however diversity should be celebrated
