It took less than 48 hours for the news to put two news stories aside so they could be better understood: on Tuesday, Feijóo said that one of the requirements for obtaining Spanish nationality should be a B2 level of Spanish. On Thursday, a judge sentenced the Vic City Council. to require level B2 of Catalan to win a civil service position.
The ruling states that requiring this level of Catalan "creates an access barrier with an exclusionary effect for anyone who doesn't prove that level." Exactly, that's what it's all about when you set a condition: if you meet it, you're in, and if you don't, you're out. But in Spain, requiring Spanish is integration, and requiring Catalan is exclusion.
Just yesterday, the 14-year-old students from the high school in front of us in the newspaper came to visit the ARA. They've all been taught in Catalan and understand it perfectly, and yet they almost only hear it when the teacher speaks to them. If the message they receive from a young age is that Catalan is dispensable for work, what's the point of the Department of Education's efforts?
Does the Government intend to say or do anything about it? We're moving towards Catalan as a language as obligatory as Spanish. Every day that passes without the difference between having the old Directorate General for Language Policy or the current Ministry becomes more evident that that decision was merely a way to facilitate the ERC's votes for the investiture. Language is one of the essential elements that give meaning to the Generalitat. Mr. President, get your act together.
