Vol. 539 No. 2
39 Mr. Quinn asked the Minister for Finance if all legislation enacted is available in the Irish language; the steps the Government is taking to comply with the terms of the judgment given in the Supreme Court on 4 April 2001 that all such legislation should be available in the Irish language; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13639/01]
The current position is that all legislation enacted up to and including 1990 has been translated and is available. All statutes for the years 1991 and 1992, with the exception of the Finance Act, 1992, and the Finance (No. 2) Act, 1992, have been translated and can be made available on demand. All statutes for the year 1998 and 20 statutes enacted in the year 1999 have been translated and are available.
In May 2000, my Department sanctioned the provision of additional staffing and financial resources to the Office of the Houses of the Oireachtas. Despite difficulties in identifying a sufficient number of suitably qualified staff, the Office of the Houses of the Oireachtas have, following a competition for the recruitment of the additional staff in the translation branch, made a number of offers of appointments. Two additional translators have recently taken up appointment and a further three are due to take up appointment early in August. The Office of the Houses of the Oireachtas remains confident that it will be able to identify sufficiently qualified staff to fill all of the ten additional posts sanctioned by my Department. Work on the clearance of the arrears of statutes awaiting translation is commencing with the appointment of the additional staff.
