Should all government offices provide to any applicant , for any purpose all documents in their native tongue?

Question

Or should all documents be in English only. The applicant would be responsible for the interpreter. NO Spanish or French either.
If one language is available all must be available. If not that is discrimination.

Answer 1

If you can't learn the language of the country your residing in then get out, the government cannot accommodate every language on earth, and that is stupid to expect that, to costly and would slow down the government process, and no it is not discrimination that's why governments like Mexico, France, and all nations expect people to learn their language. If that's discrimination then every country on earth is guilty.

Answer 2

Should all government offices provide to any applicant , for any purpose all documents in their native tongue?
Or should all documents be in English only. The applicant would be responsible for the interpreter. NO Spanish or French either.
If one language is available all must be available. If not that is discrimination.

Answer 3

I would say that the government of any country should provide forms and information in languages that are in use by 10% or more of its population. If documents are requested in languages other than those in use by 10% or more of the population they should be available at a cost to the person requesting the documents. It's not a matter of discrimination - it's a matter of economics. Making everything available in every language would impose a tremendous cost burden - in the form of taxes - to all members of the society, and when only a very, very small percentage of the populace would benefit from making documents available in, say, Sanskrit, all citizens would be sharing in the cost of producing those documents if a fee wasn't charged...and that would be unfair.

Answer 4

I disagree about discrimination. I think there should be no duty to provide interpretations. However, if a large population using the form speaks a different language, I think it only makes sense to provide different language versions. I don't think we need to provide versions in languages rarely encountered. It is a convenience, not a duty.

I believe in English as an official language, but I think people need a realistic opportunity to learn English. I also think no one benefits from poorly filled out forms.

I think people should be able to read English by the time they are citizens however, so I am open to English only ballots and voting materials. Even there I have some hesitation due to older people who might have lesser opportunity to become fluent than younger immigrants, though.

Answer 5

Documents directly related to due process should be. All others should not be. Doing so would be too cumbersome to keep government and its offices running smoothly. Everyone that lives in a country should learn to speak and read that country's major language reasonably well. If not there are going to be difficulties brought upon that person though their own personal chioce to not learnt the language. How else would people expect to communicate with everbody from neighbors, merchants, teachers,doctors, etc.?

Answer 6

I went to court and saw all the spanish speaking people getting translatoers free, so I told my court appointed attorney that I wanted a translator, he said o.k., no problem and went over to a spanish translator, they came back and my attorney said "there you go." Then I explained to my attorney that I was requesting a Shoshone-Bannock language speaking translator. He looked totally dumfounded and said that he would talk to the judge about that. It took five months and three postponements of my case before the courts saw fit to provide me with the same type of service that all the spanish speakers were getting, meanwhile I had to remain in jail. When a Shoshone-Bannock translator was provided, she had to do double duty, translating english to Shoshone for me and translating Shoshone to english for the court personnel. It was worh every hour spent waiting in my cell for the EQUAL OPPORTUNITY provided to all the Spanish speakers. What a mess for the courts though.

Answer 7

Good question.I think it would be better to have ppl that speak those languages employed in government offices.Keep the forms in English.But have ppl there that can speak Spanish,French,Chinese,etc to translate and help the ppl that need it fill out the proper forms.That way it also rewards ppl that have taken the effort to learn other languages.

Answer 8

I agree all government offices should provide applicants
documents in English and the applicant's native tongue.

Answer 9

Let's just make klingon our native language, everyone likes star trek i would think so.