It's past time the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission was abolished. It was a waste of time and money when it was set up and it's a waste of time and money now.

The Human Rights Commissioner Monica McWilliams helpfully demonstrated this point for me when she asked the Northern Ireland Office of the government to go over the heads of our oh so wonderful democratically [sic] elected executive and assembly at Stormont and implement legislation on the Irish [sic] language on the spurious basis of a little-known piece of decidedly dodgy European Union bureaucracy called the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities.

Assuming we accept that Irish constitutes a "national minority" in Northern Ireland (or, more likely, the United Kingdom) they (we) are not disadvantaged by not having our car tax forms available in Gaelic which none of us speak as a first language anyway. We are not denied access to public services because we all speak and understand English as a first language (despite the efforts of some to create language barriers). We would all, I am certain, be much better at defending ourselves against police charges in court using English than broken Gaelic.

Ms McWilliams is not doing Gaelic any favours by trying to have it imposed on the people of Northern Ireland. She was a supporter of the Good Friday Agreement and that means supporting whatever form of "democracy" it is that we have because of it, not running to central government every time they do something she doesn't like. By couhcing support for the language in terms of "rights" she's making the same mistake* of Sinn Fein and some other language "enthusiasts" in Northern Ireland.

Follow up:

Gaelic has an important place in Northern Irish society, but that place is not in civic society, not in government. The language is a significant part of cultural life here (especially if you're interested in geography or history) and should be respected accordingly. I'd like to see it explained where place names originated on somewhere more than just a hobbyists web page, useful though they can be (perhaps "Welcome to..." signs would be an appropriate starting point?). However even small measures like these will be opposed if people fear Northern Ireland will end up wasting huge chunks of it's already overstretched budget pandering to Gaelic language "enthusiasts" and pointlessly translating all sorts of government forms and road/office signs, and that would be a real shame.

If Monica McWilliams can't find something more productive to do to earn her public salary, I think it's time she did the decent thing: recommend the closure of her office. Better yet, Peter Robinson's efficiency unit could close the office down and send out a warning that those quangos found to be wasting public cash will be wrapped up.