Prime Minister recognises sign language as “incredibly valuable”

The Prime Minister has promised that the Government will look into rolling out pilot projects to improve access to sign language for deaf children and their families.

The Prime Minister was asked about the I-Sign project. This was a two-year project, taken forward by a consortium of deaf organisations, including NDCS, with the aim of raising the status of sign language in education. NDCS has led on a project to increase access to family sign language. Special family sign language classes have been piloted in the South West and the North West, whilst NDCS has also produced a new website and DVD for families wanting to learn appropriate signs for communication with young deaf children. The Prime Minister described the project as successful.

The promise to help came during Prime Minister’s Question time when Malcolm Bruce MP, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Deafness and father to a deaf daughter, asked if the Prime Minister would consider rolling out the pilot project across the rest of England. As part of the I-Sign consortium, NDCS will now be working with the Department for Education to take this forward.

More information:

NDCS Sign Up! campaign on access to family sign language

NDCS Family Sign Language website 

Transcript from Prime Minister’s Question Time:

Malcolm Bruce: Following a question from me to the Prime Minister’s predecessor three and a half years ago, the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown) set up pilot schemes to provide sign language support for deaf parents and their children in Devon and Merseyside. Those have now been completed, and they were a huge success. Will the Prime Minister meet a delegation of deaf parents, their children and their representatives to discuss how that sign language support can be extended to all children and their parents across the UK?

The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend makes a very good point. We do a lot to support different languages throughout the UK. Signing is an incredibly valuable language for many people in our country. Those pilot schemes were successful. I looked at what the previous Prime Minister said to him when he asked that question, and I will certainly arrange a meeting for him with the Department for Education to see how we can take this forward.

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