Services offered the government cannot be used if the user does not know the language  Anyone who does not know the native of the place where they reside will find themselves having problems with health-care, job centers or the taxman because they are not able to understand or communicate with these people. It doesn’t matter where you live, as a citizen you will have to use different services provided by the government. A good example will be hospitals. Hospital staff are unlikely to know the immigrant’s language so making communication difficult, a problem exacerbated by all the specialized language that may be required. Being incapable of telling your doctor what the problem is or not being able to tell a police officer what happened may have devastating consequences. Sarah Bowen, a professor at the University of Alberta and expert on access to health care believes that language is the most important barrier preventing some immigrants from staying healthy. [1] This is a barrier that remains if a little of the native language has been learnt because it is still unclear if there is mutual understanding when communicating. It is therefore clear that second generation immigrants need to be taught in the language of everyday life in the country in which they live rather than just learning it on the side as a ‘foreign’ language.  [1] ‘For newcomers, language is the most important barrier to staying healthy’, Canadian Immigrant, 27 February 2012,