33th General Assembly of the International Association of Conference
Interpreters (AIIC)
Hotel Bedford, Brussels, 12 January 2006

Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Milí hostia,
Vážené dámy a páni,

I am very pleased to be able to address you here today, on the occasion
of the thirty-third Assembly of AIIC, the International Association of
Conference Interpreters.

May I begin by extending to you all and to all those who are dear to you
my very best wishes for the coming year. I also wish AIIC a very
successful conference.

I have been asked by the organisers to deliver my speech in my mother
tongue – Slovak. I will gladly do so. I am confident that the interpretation
at this forum will be truly first class!

I would like to review in the next few minutes some of last year’s
developments and to look ahead at what 2006 has in store for us.

Last year was a year when we made considerable progress and change
in the area of multilingualism. Multilingualism has been part of the
Union’s life since the beginning. The principle has always been adhered
to and has always been applied in practice. I need not remind you that
the very first Regulation the Council of the then European Economic
Community adopted, the famous n° 1/58, established the list of official
and working languages of the Institutions. That list was updated at every
enlargement, as a result of which we now have the 20 official and
working languages of the Union.
Having said that, it was only under the present European Commission –
the Barroso Commission – that multilingualism was for the first time in
history defined as a stand-alone policy of the European Commission.
This manifests the weight attributed to the multilingualism policy by the
European institutions, not least after the enlargement of the Union.

At the same time, it is the recognition of the fact that multilingualism is at
the heart of European values, because language identifies every one of
us individually and, at the same time, connects us with our own culture.

The European Union is currently home to almost half a billion of people,
who speak 80 original European languages, but also many other
languages originating from outside of the borders of our continent. Every
one of them is unique and valuable.

Hence, Europe harbours a tremendous potential. In its language policy,
the European Commission says clearly: it is necessary to preserve this
rich linguistic and cultural diversity.

In the European multilingual society, every citizen should have the
language skills needed to make full use of opportunities offered by the
Union: inter alia the freedom to choose one’s place of study or work.

Multilingualism, however, is important not only from the economic or
social point of view. It is also of fundamental importance in terms of the
European Union’s democratic legitimacy and transparency of its
decisions. No citizen should be excluded from the democratic process in
the Union just because of the language he or she speaks.

What has the European Commission decided to do in the area of
multilingualism?

It has undertaken the following three objectives:

– to strongly encourage all citizens to learn and speak several languages,
and this way to facilitate better mutual understanding and
communication,

– to emphasise the roles of language and multilingualism in the European
economic area, and to look for ways of developing them even further,

– to preserve and protect multilingualism in the institutions of the
European Union. Our professional linguists in translation and
interpretation services will continue to endeavour to ensure effective
communication between the Union and its citizens.

Last year on 22nd November, the Commission took a new and important
step towards promoting multilingualism when it adopted its

Communication on the subject. This Communication sets out a new
framework strategy for multilingualism which addresses the whole
spectrum of language use in the EU from languages in society, to the
multilingual economy, to the EU’s own efforts to interact with citizens in
their language.

The first strand of the Communication is on the multilingual society. It
considers the language skills of the individual citizens and urges Member
States to put more resources and commitment into language teaching
and to encourage language learning more.

As you know, the long term aim is that EU citizens should acquire
practical skills in “mother tongue plus two”, an objective that was set in
2002 in Barcelona. A recent Eurobarometer survey showed that half of
the EU’s citizens say they can hold a conversation in a second language.
We think that language knowledge is a desirable life-skill for all EU
citizens of today and of tomorrow.

We would like to see more early language learning, further
improvements in language teaching and also the teaching of subjects
through foreign languages. Did you know that the Commission invests 30
million € every year in actions such as training, mobility of students and
teachers and in funding class exchanges? This happens through the
Socrates and Leonardo da Vinci programmes.

In the second chapter of the Communication, which deals with the
multilingual economy, we highlight the importance of language
knowledge for increasing the competitiveness of the European economy,
as well as the mobility of workers in our Single Market. Next year the
Commission will publish a study on the impact that shortages of
language skills are having on the European economy.

The Communication also looks into the role of the language-related
professions, including interpreting, and stresses the growing place of
languages and language services in the information society, and on the
web in particular.

The Commission is of the view that more needs to be done to strengthen
the language industries, an activity that is continuing to grow in the EU.
You may be interested to learn that the Commission is inviting Member
States to review training programmes at universities to ensure that
students in the language professions can acquire the right skills for
rapidly changing working conditions.

Last but not least, there is a chapter on multilingualism in the
Commission’s relations with citizens. The European Union, unlike other
multinational communities, passes laws that are directly binding on
citizens.

Legislation must therefore be published in all official languages of the
Union – doing otherwise would mean compromising an essential right of
citizens, as well as the legitimacy of the European Union as such.

I am sure you have come across the view that the multilingual system is
an enormous financial burden that should be reduced.

But in reality, in 2004, the translation and interpreting services of all
institutions represented 1.05% of the EU budget, which means about
2.58 euro per citizen per year.

I do believe that this is an acceptable price for universal access to the
EU’s legislation. The right of all citizens to be able to access the Union’s
legal texts in their mother tongue is one of the fundamental rights on
which the Union has been built. The possibility for citizens, as well as for
experts in meetings, to express in their mother tongue their views on
proposed legislation or other initiatives, is part and parcel of democratic
decision-making.

I would like to mention some of the commitments the Commission
adopted under the chapter on relations with citizens.

There is the launching, which actually also took place on 22nd November,
of the thematic portal about “Languages and Europe” on the Europa
server.

High level seminars on multilingualism will be organised in the Member
States, targeted at journalists and other opinion multipliers. What we
need to develop is a pro-active multilingual communication policy that will
complement the Commission’s wider initiative to improve communication
with European citizens.

And you will be happy to learn that the Directorate General for
Interpretation will continue to offer universities grants and help with the
teaching of conference interpreting. I myself am impressed with what has
been achieved in this area and I am sure the interpreting profession
appreciates the fact that, like AIIC, we relentlessly emphasise the need
for quality in interpreting and in interpreter training.

Finally, let me mention that the Commission envisages the creation of a
High Level group of independent experts who will analyse the progress
made by Member States and will provide support and advice in new
initiatives. In 2007, we plan to organize a ministerial conference on
multilingualism.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Let me say a few words about the main challenges for the interpretation
service of the European Commission in 2006. 2004 saw the arrival of
nine new working languages, for which we had prepared very fully and
carefully in the field of conference interpreting. I can conclude that the
process of adapting to the new situation has been proceeding rather
successfully and that the European institutions continue to increase their
capacity of interpretation in the new languages as well as its quality.

But this is not the end of the road of course. On 1st January 2007, Irish
will be added, the scope of its use having been determined by the Irish
authorities. Romanian and Bulgarian will join the EU language family on
the date of accession of the two countries concerned.

Furthermore, we now have the so-called co-official languages from
Spain, which are Catalan, Galician and Basque. They will not be used
as extensively as the official languages. However, I am able to announce
that all three were used recently, at the December plenary of the
Committee of the Regions, and that this service was provided by the
Commission’s DG Interpretation or SCIC.

If I were to ask its Director General what had marked him most in 2005,
I’m sure his reply would be, without hesitation “Hampton Court”. That is
shorthand for an event involving the Commission’s interpreting service:
the London European Council in October of last year had a 20-20 team
plus the candidate countries’ languages and was interpreted entirely in
remote or tele-interpreting.

From the interpreting point of view things went very smoothly, thanks to
excellent preparation and close co-operation with the UK presidency,
and above all the professionalism of the interpreters. But the event
caused quite a stir among many staff and freelance interpreters. This
was understandable because, although I hear that remote interpreting is
not infrequent on the private market, it had never been done on such a
scale within the Institutions.

It is unlikely that remote interpreting will ever make up a sizeable part of
the interpreting work within our Institutions, but we have to move with the
times and so occasional reoccurrences cannot be ruled out and we need
to be prepared for them.

I and DG SCIC have now undertaken not to accept any more remote
interpreting assignments until working conditions for such events have
been agreed with interpreters. We are ready to start discussing this
important matter as early as possible in the New Year.

We must move with the times I said. I will merely mention the very far
reaching changes that have happened on the travel market over the last
few years, something the Court of Auditors put a certain emphasis on in
its report on the Institutions’ language services last year. This is why we
want to take a fresh look, together with AIIC, at some parts of the
Agreement of 1999. We see this as an important item on our agenda for

2006. 
      Ladies and Gentlemen,
      It is also with the help of the multilingualism policy that the European
      Union is becoming what it seeks to be: a society of peacefully co-habiting
      people from many different cultural and language communities.
      Multilingualism, therefore, is part and parcel of our joint process of
      integration.
      The role of the European Commission is to fully respect and support the
      multilingual nature of Europe, and in this way to bring the European
      Union closer to citizens, and to make it more transparent, legitimate and
      effective.
      The coming year promises to be a busy and an important one for the
      European Commission, DG SCIC, for the AIIC and for the profession. I
      am confident that we will achieve good and positive results.
      Let me reiterate my best wishes to you all and to your Association.
      
      Ďakujem vám za pozornosť.