Is £100,000,000 PA on UK translation services value for money?

Question

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6174303.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6172805.stm

Mordent, your answer is a denial of the facts, the Welsh do their own translations they speak English as well you know

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20071207/tpl-uk-britain-translation-ed79be6_2.html

Answer 1

This is just another indication that mass immigration is not helping the UK, rather it costs the UK a lot

Increased house prices due to immigration costs the UK more even than this.

Answer 2

As I understand it, you are asking two question, one is the NWS worth what it provides for the citizenry, and two, are the Noaa and commensurate met office in the UK a worthwhile part of the weather reporting service. As a corollary you brought up the cost of a littoral combat ship, and the money spent on the weather service. Are their comparative costs worthwhile? Yes NOAA has been accused in the press and in this forum of being a political biased organization. And, they have been accused of funding and participating in research which is designed to further specific political agendas, of losing or deleting data unfriendly to their agenda, and mostly at this time, establishing a correlation between CO2/greenhouse gas relationships with global warming. But that is not your question. The NWS is usually only a reporter of weather, not of climate issues, and we as a country need that service to provide our citizenry with timely and correct information, in as far as is available. So yes, the NWS is good value for the money spent. It does not appear to me that they should be removed from the NOAA, although there are those who want that to happen. Your evaluation that "there is virtually no conventional military threat to the US soil" may or may not be valid. There are those who believe that the next armed conflict the US will be involved in will be a second civil war. I hope that is not the case, as a lot of people will die for no reason. You seem to be suggesting that having the ship or the NWS is an either/or situation, which is not correct, we can afford them both, and we should have them, and by the way, Littoral's are designed to operate in relatively shallow water, which makes them ideal to stop piracy against our commercial ships, and that is a very valid reason for their existence. Of course, we should not over look the Canadians, they always seem to be looking for a fight(NOT, I am only kidding, I like Canuks)

Answer 3

I agree with Amy!

By providing translation services we are discouraging immigrants to learn the language, thereby perpetuating the problem.

Look at it this way.

If you could get free health care, free housing, free transport, money to spend and send home to your family and all you had to do in return was learn how to ask for it.

Wouldn't you learn?

Answer 4

If it has to be done it has to be done. I believe English tests SHOULD be introduced for immigrants on a shorter term and asylum seekers on a long term, and it will prejudice your case if you don't learn it.

However; documents also have to be translated into our other official langauges - mostly Welsh - that's surely got to cost a lot of money. Just about everything in Wales is also in Welsh; I reckon that's got to be a very large proportion of that translation budget right there.

Answer 5

It depends what you mean by 'value for money'.
Yes - if you believe everybody deserves equal rights to public services
No - if you believe the only people who deserve anything are white British born people who can trace their ancestry back at least 100 years!

Answer 6

No a small portion of that money could be used teaching those people to speak english this will make it easier for them to get jobs and pay their own way in life.

Answer 7

firstly i question the actual amounts

secondly, i know i couldnt do my job properly without getting translators for families that need them. how would i explain psychological and emotional dynamics in a family with english as their second language, how do i explain child protection procedures to them in broken english, how do i explain the law with regard to health, education and social services when they dont understand what im saying. most english families dont understand the complex procedures they're part of when we work with them, let alone somone whose mother language is not english