Carmarthenshire County Council’s Cabinet has approved its Welsh Language Promotion Strategy, which has been developed in collaboration with partners of the Welsh Strategic Forum in the county, and where better to officially launch it, than at the Carmarthenshire Urdd Eisteddfod 2023.
Carmarthenshire’s Welsh Language Promotion Strategy was launched today, Thursday, 1 June, during an event chaired by Meri Huws, former Welsh Language Commissioner and Chair of the Carmarthenshire Welsh Language Strategic Forum.
The aim of the Strategy is to make Welsh the main language of the county. Our aim, as a County Council and with our partners, is to restore Welsh to a language spoken and used regularly by the majority of our residents, and in all aspects of life.
The vision set in the Welsh Language Promotion Strategy is innovative and ambitious. Carmarthenshire County Council and its partners want to see an increase in the proportion of the County that can speak Welsh and use their Welsh regularly.
We want to see the Welsh language as the norm when working and operating in the County’s public institutions and increasingly prevalent in businesses in the County. We want our young people to see a future for themselves in the County in sustainable and prosperous Welsh communities, economically, culturally and socially.
We want everyone to be proud of the Welsh language in Carmarthenshire.
The recently published 2021 Population Census Results highlighted that Carmarthenshire experienced the highest percentage loss of Welsh speakers of all the counties of Wales, for the second decade running.
Recognising the alarming decline in the number of Welsh speakers within the county, and by working with our partners, the local authority is taking firm and confident action to stop this damaging trend and will set out its plans at the launch of its Welsh Language Promotion Strategy at the Urdd Eisteddfod in Llandovery.
Cllr. Glynog Davies, Cabinet Member for Education and Welsh Language said: “The use of the Welsh language and its continuation in Carmarthenshire is absolutely vital to the survival of Welsh language in Wales.
“The decline in the number of Welsh speakers within our communities is a grave concern and an issue that we must address. This strategy will be integral in our commitment to turn the tide in Carmarthenshire and, I believe, provide an example to the whole of Wales to follow.
“I would like to thank all partners of the County Council for their willingness to work together, through the County’s Welsh Language Strategic Forum, to develop the Welsh Language Promotion Strategy, for which the Council has a statutory responsibility. It would not have been possible to introduce the Strategy without the full support of the Forum and I look forward to another five-years of working together for the benefit of the Welsh language in Carmarthenshire.
“I’m very pleased to be able to launch the Welsh Language Promotion Strategy at the Carmarthenshire Urdd Eisteddfod. This is a youth festival, and the youth of today are the ones who will pass the language on to the next generation. It’s important therefore that we look confidently to the future to encourage confidence within Welsh speakers to use the language across all aspects of their lives.”
For further information, please contact Carmartheshire County Council 01267 224900/ pressoffice@carmarthenshire.gov.uk
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