WRITTEN QUESTION E-3062/01 by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission. Enhancing the integration and future prospects of Roma children by adequate provision of education in their own language and culture.
Date: 2001-11-07
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: EU programme, Roma, backwardness at school, education policy, ethnic discrimination, language teaching, linguistic discrimination, teaching

16.5.2002

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

C 115 E/221

(2002/C 115 E/236)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-3062/01

by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(7 November 2001)

Subject: Enhancing the integration and future prospects of Roma children by adequate provision of

education in their own language and culture

Is the Commission aware that providing children from new groups of immigrants, who speak
1.
Turkish or Arabic at home, with schooling in their own language and culture has helped them acquire a
better command of the common language of the communities in which they live, thereby contributing to
their integration?

2.
Is the Commission taking account of the fact that the Roma people are spread over several countries
and, unlike most other European peoples, do not have their own territory, which means that after the
accession of new member states from Central Europe many more EU citizens than at present will have a
first language that is not one of the official languages of administration and education?

3.
Does the Commission consider that the fact that schools where all or most of the pupils are Roma
children do not generally offer those children education in their own language and culture is one of the
possible explanations for the lower educational achievements and limited chances on the labour market of
this population group?

4.
Is the Commission also aware that the failure of the authorities concerned to provide education in
the Roma language and culture in villages and districts which are largely populated by Roma households,
particularly in the Slovak Republic, has hitherto been justified on the grounds that Roma is a language
which has no written form and no standard vocabulary or syntax and education can therefore only be
provided in the majority language of the country concerned?

5. What does the Commission know about the efforts now being made by linguists and others involved
to develop a standard spelling of the Roma language, as far as possible for the whole of Europe, to
facilitate its use in literature, theatre and education?

6.
Is the Commission prepared to encourage steps to integrate the Roma language into the school
curriculum, as is being done in the Swedish city of Malmö, at least in areas where Roma make up more
than 10 % of the population?

Answer given by Mrs Reding on behalf of the Commission

(20 December 2001)

The Commission has noted the information provided by the Honourable Member, particularly points 1-3,
and would like to remind him that the responsibility for the organisation of education systems, including
the content of teaching, lies exclusively with the Member States.

The Commission does not have any information on the subject referred to in point 3.

The question of
Commission’s priority subjects within its education programmes and initiatives.

teaching migrants’

languages and language learning by minorities is one of

the

Under the Comenius action of the Socrates programme, the Commission is funding a number of projects
on the subject of school failure and the children at risk, especially among marginalised groups such as the
Roma and Sinti. This includes the development of teaching materials in the respective languages, as well as
the use of information and communication technologies to encourage these groups to use their own
languages.

Institutions that are involved in Roma and Sinti education are among the participants in projects funded
by the Commission in the field of intercultural education and education for children of migrant workers
and travellers.

C 115 E/222

Official Journal of the European Communities

EN

16.5.2002

The socio-linguistic situation in the Roma and Sinti communities is extremely complex. Their language has
many different variants, which are sometimes mutually incomprehensible, and the situation is further
complicated by contacts with the languages of the majority populations amongst which these communities
live. Furthermore, the members of the communities are themselves often opposed to the development of a
standard written form of their language and its use by outsiders. As a result, teaching the languages and
cultures of the Roma and Sinti communities in schools is impeded by obstacles which are sometimes
difficult to overcome.

The Commission is aware of various initiatives to standardise the Roma language, but is not aware of any
standard form having been accepted by all of Europe’s Rome and Sinti communities.

Under the Phare programme, the Commission has promoted projects on better integration of Roma
children into the normal school environment and on improving Roma school attendance by encouraging
teaching of Roma language and culture and by providing second-chance education for those who never
finished their compulsory education. Such projects have been or are being implemented in a number of
candidate countries, including Romania, Bulgaria and Slovakia.

(2002/C 115 E/237)

WRITTEN QUESTION P-3070/01

by Chantal Cauquil (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(26 October 2001)

Subject: Death of dolphins in Community waters

Several articles have appeared in the press concerning the death of dolphins accidentally caught in the
mesh of large European fishing vessels’ pelagic trawls. Reportedly, several hundred dead cetaceans are
found each year on the French and English coasts.

These cetaceans are, however, protected under European Directive 92/43/EEC (1).

What action does the Commission intend to take to ensure that its directives are complied with?

(1) OJ L 206, 22.7.1992, p. 7.

Answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission

(27 November 2001)

All cetacean species are strictly protected under the Habitats Directive (1), which, inter alia, forces Member
States to establish a system to monitor the incidental capture and killing of these species. In the light of the
information gathered, Member States should take further research or conservation measures as required to
ensure that incidental capture and killing does not have a significant negative impact on the species
concerned.

If the Community law is broken, then the Commission will take all the necessary steps to ensure that
Community legislation is properly applied by Member States.

The Commission is aware that most of studies on the state of conservation of small cetaceans point to the
risk that by-catch of some species is attaining levels that might endanger the sustainability of some
cetacean populations. However, the relative contribution of different fishing methods to this problem as
well as its extent is still to be fully quantified.

So far there are few hypotheses about how cetacean by-catch in pelagic trawls occurs and consequently
few suggestions about how to reduce it.