Dollars thwarted Hawke Language Policy

AUSTRALIA’S first national policy on languages had social as well as economic aims.

But Cabinet papers from 1987, released this month, tell the story of a policy adopted at a time of tight public finances, and amid some scepticism.

Based on work by Melbourne University’s Joe Lo Bianco, the policy included a balance between community languages and those of “economic and diplomatic importance”, a boost to Asian studies, intensive English for migrants, work on adult literacy, and support for Aboriginal languages.

“This government’s national languages policy is a concerted response to the crisis in languages education in Australia, which is the result of many years of neglect,” said a draft media release included in documents for Bob Hawke’s Cabinet.

“Language learning and use are too closely related to Australia’s economic development to allow languages to languish as a forgotten part of the curriculum.”

The budget proposed in a background note was $20.17 million in 19877-88, $36.4m in 1988-89, and $35.11m in 1989-90.

But Treasury said any new spending had to be offset by savings because the “overall budgetary picture … allows no scope for net additions to prospective outlays”.

And the Department of Industry, Technology and Commerce argued for a “greater accent on economic objectives” in the new languages policy. Citing the “pressing need” to improve Australia’s international competitiveness and external account, the department urged that more money be spent on “economic and diplomatic” languages at the expense of community languages.

Cabinet agreed to a $15m package to implement the policy, noting “it would not be necessary to announce (initially) the mechanism for funding community languages”.

In recent years, federal language policy has focused in a haphazard way on Asian languages but has failed to arrest sharp declines in enrolments.

The Abbott administration has yet to say how it intends to deliver on an election promise to have 40 per cent of Year 12 students taking a second language within a decade. On the most recent estimates, the current figure is about 12 per cent.