- June 1, 2012
- 232
Stundys: new version of the law will boost the position of Lithuanian language
According to the head of the parliamentary Committee on Education, Science and Culture, the conservative Valentinas Stundys, new version of the Law on the State Language will boost the position of Lithuanian in all areas of public life.
During a plenary session next week, the parliament is planning to consider the draft of a new version of the Law on the State Language, as well as the associated changes to individual articles of the Municipality Law on Local Self-government, the Law on the State Language Inspectorate and the Code of Administrative Offences, the Homeland Union – Lithuanian Christian Democrats informs.
According to Stundys, the new law is set to boost the position of the Lithuanian language in all areas of public life, define the issues of regulation and control over the use of the state language and the liability for the breach of the law.
“In comparison to the current law, the new draft determines in greater detail the norms of the use of the state language in the various areas of public life: in the activity of state institutions and self-government, in their relations with natural and legal persons, the requirements concerning the service to and communication with the consumers, the rules concerning public writings, and more, are delineated there,” claims the deputy, quoted in a conservative bulletin. Stundys emphasizes that according to the law each Lithuanian citizen should know and respect the Lithuanian language, and that every person has the right to use it and to obtain information in it in all domains of public life, without having to invoke that right.
In the executory documents of the law, the creation of a new system of control over the use and correctness of the state language is proposed. “The current system is exercised on two mutually independent levels, i.e. on the state level, by the State Language Inspectorate, and on the self-government level. Such system does not guarantee the universality, quality and effectiveness of control. Adoption of these changes will ensure the creation of a uniform state control system, and the State Language Inspectorate will perform its functions through municipal units,” Stundys says.
According to the head of the Committee, the institutions controlling labour, tax offices, environmental protection, the building industry, cultural heritage and other domains, function along these lines.
Tłumaczenie Aleksandra Musiał w ramach praktyk w Europejskiej Fundacji Praw Człowieka, www.efhr.eu. Translated by Aleksandra Musiał within the framework of a traineeship programme of the European Foundation of Human Rights, www.efhr.eu.
