WELSH speakers would be handed new language "rights" under radical proposals announced yesterday. The Welsh Language Board called for an independent regulator with statutory powers to police those rights within public sector services. They said staff in public bodies should have the right to use Welsh in their workplace "essential for the long term health and viability of the language". The board said the existing 1993 Welsh Language Act would need to be overhauled to bring it up to date. The announcement by the language quango board, due to be scrapped and merged with the Assembly government in 2007, set it on a collision course with the Labour administration last night. An Assembly government spokesperson said it would not countenance "Quebec-style" language laws in Wales even though it understood the quango was going through its "death throes". "It's for elected politicians to agree the way forward for public policy in Wales," she said.. "We are talking about a situation where English speak-ers have rights too. "Turkeys don't vote for Christmas but noone voted for the language board either." The language pressure group Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg, which ran a graffiti campaign calling for a new language act, said the society and the board "are on the same side on this issue probably for the first time ever." Language board chairwoman Meri Huws said the Assembly's proposed new law-making powers in 2007 could be used to pass responsibility for language legislation to Cardiff Bay from Westminster. "It's a difficult debate and it's one that has to be by evolution. We aren't disenfranchising the 80% of English speakers by strengthening the rights of 20%," she said.. "Two rights don't make a wrong." The board said that core rights should be established in law for Welsh speakers. These could include: the right to correspond with public bodies in Welsh; receive and fill in Welsh forms, contribute to a public inquiry or meeting; receive public telephone services, including helplines. Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg campaigns officer Dafydd Morgan Lewis said: "Today's announcement means that Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg and the Welsh Language Board are on the same side on this issue probably for the first time ever. "Alun Pugh the minister for culture and the Welsh Assembly government are now isolated in the opposing camp." An Assembly government spokesperson agreed work was needed to clarify the rights of Welsh speakers. But she added: "What this government won't do is introduce new primary legislation either here or in Westminster, which is focused entirely on people who already speak Welsh. "We need to take the 80% of those who don't speak Welsh with us." | 
