The six main institutions and associations committed to the development of Maltese today expressed their gratitude to the members of the National Council of the Maltese Language for their dedication and for the professional way in which they have carried out their work for the development of our national language.
The activities of the Council were spread over a number of fields and were intended to produce long term benefits. For instance, together with the Department of Maltese at the University, the Council has, for the last eleven years, been providing a University course for proofreaders. In all, close to four hundred people from all walks of life have been thoroughly trained in this area. Furthermore, the Council has been working for the development of Maltese in important sectors, as in the case of geography books and sport terminology in Maltese. It has also been heavily involved in the effort to produce bilingual signage in Maltese and English in our roads, at the Sir Anthony Mamo Oncology Centre at Mater Dei hospital, and in public transport.
Much of the Council's work was carried out in collaboration with other institutions, such as the Akkademja tal-Malti, the Department of Maltese at the University and the Education Division.
All this testifies to the harmony which exists among the organisations which work for the consolidation of Maltese. The publication of the Damma by Agius de Soldanis is a good example of this collaboration. In addition to ongoing consultation with the public, the Council has been engaged in specialised consultation with nonlinguistic experts in certain fields, such as geography teachers and medical personnel.
We would also like to thank the Council for the work carried out in recent years by the subcommittee charged with studying the question of the writing of English loanwords in Maltese. We now have a sound system for writing such words. The Council proceeded with great caution and has shown that serious scholars of Maltese are able to come up with concrete solutions following professional research activity and continuous public consultation. The decisions which the Council has arrived at avoid the mistakes made in the past, when the Council did not exist.
Teachers, journalists, broadcasters, authors, publishers, translators, and the public in general can now rest assured that in so far as such words are concerned, they have at their disposal decisions based on serious research on linguistic phenomena in Malta and abroad, in addition to a wide and very public consultation process.
These decisions were received very well by those who took part in the latest public seminar organised by the Council. Since the consultation process is now over, we ask the Council to publish these final decisions as soon as possible to avoid further uncertainty.
At the same time we ask the Minister for Education and Employment to see that, in accordance with the Maltese Language Act, the Council finally has its National Centre for the Maltese Language. Like other national councils in different fields, the Language Council requires decent premises to carry out its work. The office of the Council should also have more employees who are professionals in their field in order to develop its activity further.
Now that the term of the current Council has come to an end, we exhort the Minister to appoint the new Council, as required by law, a Council made up of experts in Maltese and representatives of sectors which are working directly towards the professional development of Maltese. When the Council for Maltese was established unanimously by Parliament in 2005, this was the structure which everyone had agreed on, a structure which has amply shown its worth through the results achieved.
The Council has carried out its work professionally and in a collegial manner because it operated with scholarly and academic intent. We expect the Minister to uphold this level of seriousness when he appoints the new members. The new Council has to have a clear majority of Maltese language experts and heads of the technical committees nominated by the institutions mentioned in the Act.
The statement was signed by Department of Maltese, University of Malta; Institute of Linguistics, University of Malta; Department of Maltese, University of Malta Junior College; L-Għaqda tal-Malti - Università; L-Għaqda tal-Qarrejja tal-Provi tal-Malti; L-Akkademja tal-Malti
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