UK Council on Deafness

Official Recognition of British Sign Language Campaign update - February 2002

The UK Council on Deafness has played a co-ordinating role in the campaign for recognition of BSL. The campaign has been supported actively by many deaf organisations locally and nationally.

As a result of lobbying by the BDA, the Scottish Parliament debated the issue of BSL recognition on 16 February 2000. The debate was well attended by Members of the Scottish Parliament representing all political parties, many of whom spoke in support of the motion urging official recognition of BSL. Following the debate, a Cross Party Group on Deafness was established, comprising members of all parliamentary parties in Scotland. A similar debate took place in the National Assembly for Wales in 1999, after a Statement of Opinion was raised. This debate also attracted widespread cross-party support for the principle of official recognition.

Tom Levitt introduced an adjournment debate in the House of Commons on 5 April 2000. In reply to this debate, the then Minister for Disabled People, Margaret Hodge, promised that she would consider the issue of recognition of BSL under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages and that "the government will explore the matter with other parties in Europe, once we have ratified the charter" .

The UK has now signed and ratified the European Council Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. However, the government has so far refused to specify BSL as one of the minority languages to which provisions in part three of the Charter shall be applied. (It has declared that provisions in part three will be applied to Welsh, Scottish Gaelic and Irish). Provisions in part three are those detailed measures which signatories undertake to implement to promote the use of regional and minority languages in public life (which includes education, judicial authorities, public services, media, cultural activities and facilities, and economic and social life).

The UK government has previously taken the view that the Charter is not the best vehicle for taking forward the issue of BSL recognition. However, they have agreed that this issue should be discussed by the Committee of Experts that oversees the Charter. The government has now appointed a UK representative to that Committee, Emyr Lewis. The BDA takes the view that it is not for the Committee of Experts to take the lead in deciding whether or not the Charter can be applied to Sign Languages, but rather to consider the merits of applying the Charter to a specific sign language, once that language has been specified by a signatory state as one of the languages to which it wishes the Charter to apply. We would urge the government to declare its intention to apply the Charter to BSL. However, the BDA has also written to the UK representative asking for guidance on how consideration might be given to the issue of applying the Charter to sign languages.

In May 2000, the government asked the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) to provide advice on how the issue of official recognition might be taken forward. The DRC in turn sought advice from the UK Council on Deafness. The BDA led this coalition which made a joint submission to the DRC calling for the establishment of a national BSL taskforce and for official recognition of BSL under the European Charter.

The DRC made the following recommendations

• The government should recognise BSL through inclusion in the Council of Europe's Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, if necessary through post ratification.
• The Commission should produce, in conjunction with the Government, specific DDA guidance to clarify in which situations the provision of BSL interpretation by a fully qualified interpreter should be regarded as a reasonable adjustment. The guidance is necessary to support the Charter recognition.
• The Government should increase the funding available for the development of interpreter services. In addition, the government should work with the CACDP, ASLI and SASLI to develop a system of regulation to ensure that interpreter services are delivered to professional standards.
• The Government should commission an independent study on the incidence and demography of BSL usage, the reasons for the incidence and demography and the degree of dependency on BSL. The study should also examine the costs associated with the proposed inclusion of BSL within the Charter and what level of interpreter provision is needed.
• The government should build in a review process three years after the ratification under the Charter to determine whether there is a need for a BSL Act or other legislative action to secure the rights of Deaf people.

On 7 August 2001, the Chair of the DRC, Bert Massie, wrote to the new Minister for Disabled People, Maria Eagle, to express the DRC's disappointment at the lack of progress made by the government in taking forward the Commission's recommendations. In particular, he expressed disappointment at the failure to agree the need for joint guidance/code of practice on the provision of BSL/English interpreting as a reasonable adjustment under the DDA. He also noted that the government response only cited already agreed expansion of funding for interpreter training, and made no comment on additional investment.

During the campaign the Federation of Deaf People has

• Drafted the Rationale for BSL Recognition
• Visited the European Parliament
• Organised four national Conferences
• Organised three national BSL Marches in London
• Collected over 50,000 names in petitions
• Encouraged Deaf people to contact their local MPs for support
• Supported a spate of local BSL Marches
• Ran workshops on BSL related issues
• Submitted BSL document to the DRC
• Sent questionnaires to all Councils in the UK to find out whether or not they recognise BSL as a community language
• Working with some local Councils on incorporating BSL into their policies to show that it does not cost as much as feared.
• Organised a Signival (BSL Festival)

The FDP believes BSL recognition is important because:

• The DDA is aimed to eliminate discrimination but it won't bring equality for Deaf people.
• There is a difference between BSL as a tool ("to help these Deaf people") and BSL as a language in its own right. It has been recognised by linguists all over the world, including those from outside Deaf field.
• There is generally a negative perception of Deaf people. This leads to low expectations of Deaf people.
• Language and logic. All children (and adults) must have a language to enable cognition, communication, education, social and psychological development.
• Social exclusion. The number of Deaf people who revert to BSL after leaving school is very telling.
• There is a high proportion of Deaf people with mental health problems (most of them due to lack of communication
• Deaf people have poor access to the community they live in.

The FDP therefore recommends that the Government:

• Establishes an independent British Sign Language Task Force: to review existing legislation and policy and to make recommendations for promoting the legal status of BSL
• Gives greater focus to the European Parliament resolutions rather than the Council of Europe's Charter
• Passes a British Sign Language Act to ensure that BSL carries the same status as the English language in the UK, and also to place positive obligations, which are of vertical direct effect
• Sets up a small number of pilot projects to test out the proposed legislative changes in a small number of local authority areas. Also to BSL being included as a second language option in some mainstream schools.

In December 2001 Maria Eagle, the new Minister for Disabled People, asked the UK Council on Deafness to organise a meeting with leaders of deaf organisations so that she could find out what 'recognition' would mean and what practical differences it would make to deaf people. Representatives from BDA, FDP, RNID, NDCS, RAD and SIGN met the minister on 31st January 2002 and called for BSL to be included in the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, for the government to establish a Taskforce to look at what changes to legislation are required and for the government to encourage the European Parliament to recommend that member states comply with the resolution that indigenous Sign Languages be recognised. The organisations expressed their frustration and disappointment at the lack of progress by the government towards recognising BSL, especially given the strength of feeling and unity between all the major D/deaf organisations. Despite no firm outcomes from the meeting, Susan Daniels, Chief Executive of NDCS said that it was "A good opportunity to show the Minister that a wide range of deaf organisations are united behind the call for the recognition of BSL."

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