Government officials spent more on Cornish language lessons than on English ones for struggling Brits, reveals damning report
GOVERNMENT integration officials spent more on Cornish language lessons than on English ones for struggling UK residents.
Ensuring everyone can speak the national language is a key finding of Dame Louise Casey’s landmark report on integration and extremism.
Poor English is a major cause of segregation, which is now at “worrying levels”, the senior civil servant found.
But despite language skills being a priority for years, the Casey Review heaped pressure on Tory ministers by revealing the Department for Communities and Local Government spent nothing at all on helping people learn English between 2011 and 2013.
But over the same period, it blew £280,000 on lessons in Cornish, in a bid to protect the niche West Country language.
Theresa May faced further embarrassment when the report also revealed the budget for English as a second language was cut by 40% by the Coalition government - from £200m a year in 2010 down to just £120m in 2015.
And the government faced ridicule when it even failed to spell the word ‘integration’ properly.
In his written statement to Parliament on the Casey Review, Local Government Secretary misspelled it ‘intergration’.
The English failings were one of a series of shock revelations about how successive ministers failed to handle mass immigration over a 15-year period.
Mass immigration to Britain has changed it beyond recognition and turned communities into ghettos
The Casey Review said: “The department responsible for integration policy spending more promoting the Cornish language than the English language”.
It added: “A number of providers of English Language courses told us that funding from Government had reduced in recent years.
“They felt that there was a significant gap in funding for pre-entry and entry level English language courses.”
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Not being able to speak English has been proved to create major disadvantages, including poorer education standards and lower wages.
In 2011, it was discovered that 760,000 people aged 16 or older in England can’t speak English well or at all – which is 1.8% of the population.
And English is not the first language for 694,000 secondary pupils and 477,000 primary school pupils.
The group who speaks the national language worst is Muslim women, with an alarming total of 189,931 of them struggling with it.
In her landmark 198 page report, Dame Louise also blasted trade unions for trying to block a plan for all public sector workers to speak English two years ago.
The senior civil servant – who also leads the Troubles Families programme – said: “At its most serious, it might mean public sector leaders ignoring harm or denying abuse”.
The Casey Review was welcomed from all sides of the political divide, from the Labour Party to UKIP.
But Downing Street’s response was lukewarm.
Officials said Mrs May was yet to agree to any of Dame Louise’s list of proposals – from making all public officials swear a new oath to uphold British values to getting school children of different races to play together more.
The PM’s official spokeswoman would only say: “It’s a very comprehensive review, we will need to study findings closely.
“It’s important we address some of the concerns raised in it.”
DCLG officials admitted the ministry has spent £780,000 on the Cornish language over the past six years.
But they also insisted funding for English lessons has been significantly increased in the last two years, and they are now spending millions a year.