THE Irish Presidency of the EU should adopt a more "proactive" policy towards minority languages during the remainder of its tenure, according to the European Bureau for Lesser Used Languages.
Directors of the bureau asked the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Mr Higgins, yesterday to act on a series of recommendations before next month's meeting on EU language policy in Spiddal, Co Galway.
The meeting will be the first time an EU presidency has organised a formal meeting on minority languages. It comes at a time of increasing awareness of the difficult linguistic choices facing an expanding EU in the coming years and of continuing pressure from Irish language organisations for enhanced status for Irish at EU level.
The bureau's Welsh president, Mr Allan Wynne Jones, said any revision of the Maastricht Treaty should include specific measures to protect linguistic and cultural diversity. "It is important that all languages and cultures be included in this process and not only the official languages of the member states."
Mr Wynne Jones called on Mr Higgins, as president of the Cultural Council, to throw his "full political weight" behind proposals from the European Parliament to increase the budget for minority languages to 4 1/2 million ecus.
"The budget line currently contains four million ecus, a nominal sum which does not adequately fund the necessary measures to conserve and develop our languages and attendant cultures at European level", he said.
He also asked the Minister to press for an act to strengthen the legal basis for EU funding of minority languages. This would be in line with a decision by the three main EU institutions that every budget line should henceforth have a legal act to justify it.
The bureau's general secretary, Mr Donall O Riagain, said the meeting in Spiddal offered "a lot of scope for collective action" between language planning agencies in different EU states. This could include joint submissions on audio visual policy.
He said Ireland should press for the deletion of the unanimity clause in Article 128 of the Maastricht Treaty. The article says the EU "shall contribute to the flowering of the cultures of the member states, while respecting their national and regional diversity and at the same time bringing the common cultural heritage to the fore."
Mr O Riagain said unanimous agreement on cultural matters within the EU was becoming more and more difficult to achieve. Article 128 would remain largely ineffective unless it was amended.