Speaking In Tongues - Irish And Ulster-Scots For Broadcast

While stateside voices and a Texas drawl might have been in evidence yesterday during US President George Bush's whistle-stop visit to Northern Ireland, it was 'accénts' of a different kind that PM Gordon Brown was backing.

He used yesterday's brief stop in Belfast to pledge £6m to "secure the future of Irish language broadcasting in Northern Ireland" - a move that will also underscore future funding for the 'homely tongue': Ulster-Scots.

Sinn Féin announced afterwards that Mr Brown would provide support for the 'threatened' Irish Language Broadcast Fund during a meeting with party President Gerry Adams and NI Executive Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness at Stormont on Monday.

Adams said the PM confirmed the future of the project, which was created out of the Good Friday Agreement, but had been unclear after a failure to secure substantial funding beyond 2009.

Mr Adams revealed that £12m has already been pumped into the fund since 2005 with a target of achieving 75 additional hours of Irish language programmes on screens per year.

But it was during his visit to Stormont Castle with US President George Bush yesterday that Mr Brown said that he would provide £6m support from the Treasury.

"Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness talked with Mr Brown about the fund at Number 10 a couple of weeks ago," said a Sinn Féin spokesman.

Meanwhile, the NI Minister for Culture, Arts and Leisure, Gregory Campbell has today welcomed the announcement of an extension of the Irish Language Broadcast Fund for a further two years.

He noted that funding for the Irish Language Broadcast Fund was first made available as part of the Joint Declaration in 2003 when £12m was announced for the fund and a similar amount for the Ulster-Scots Academy.

"The funding was available until the end of the current financial year. The additional funding which has been made available by the UK government will allow the fund to continue for a further two years," he said.

He also said that he welcomed the announcement of this further money for the fund and looked forward to being able to ensure that both the Irish Language and Ulster-Scots achieve comparable treatment of funding in the future.

Northern Ireland Screen is delivering this commitment through the Irish Language Broadcast Fund, which is a sub-committee of the NI Screen Board.

The UK Government has agreed to make the money available to ensure the fund continues for the final two years of the Comprehensive Spending Review (2009-10 and 2010 – 11).

The Joint Declaration also made a sum of £12m available for the Ulster-Scots Academy and work is said to be underway to progress this.

(BMcC)