Multilingualism

Multilingualism - a democratic principle

The principle of multilingualism lies at the heart of the European Union and its democratic institutions. 

Firmly rooted in European treaties, multilingualism is the reflection of the cultural and linguistic diversity of the European Union. It also makes the European institutions more accessible and transparent for the general public, which constitutes a guarantee for the success of the EU's democratic system.

Under Parliament's Rules of Procedure community languages have an  important place. Parliamentary documents are published in all of the 23 official languages of the European Union and every MEP has the right to speak and to follow debates in the language of their choice.

Translating and Interpreting

The rules adopted by the European Economic Community in 1958 laid down that the four official languages of the institutions would Dutch, French, German and Italian, reflecting the needs of the founding countries, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

From 1 January 2007, the European Union has had a total of 23 official languages. In order for MEPs and officials of the 27 member states to communicate, debate and discuss freely, the European Parliament operates a translation and interpreting service covering all of these languages.

Besides the four languages of the founding members, EU business is now conducted in languages as diverse as English, Greek, Portuguese, Spanish, Finnish, Swedish. In 2004, Czech, Estonian, Hungarian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Slovak and Slovene became official EU languages. Most recently Bulgarian and Romanian have been added to the list.

The appointment of a European Commissioner for multilingualism in 2007 underlines the importance of languages.

Cost and benefits
As the EU has expanded with the accession states so the cost of translation and interpreting has risen sharply. Today the European Parliament and EU institutions employ over 1500 linguists. Multilingualism represents over one third of the EU administration’s total expenditure.

Interpreters provide simultaneous translation at plenary sessions, meetings of the governing body as well as for committees and delegations. The European Parliament, the Council of Ministers, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions use professional interpreters, translators and lawyer-linguists to ensure the highest standards of accuracy.

Over two million pages are translated each year by EU institutions, most of it by the European Parliament. After the enlargement of the European Union in 2004, demand for translations grew more than fivefold.

Since 2005 the European Parliament has translated over a million pages a year. For 2006 the cost of translation throughout all EU institutions was €800 million. 

Translation

Parliament employs almost 700 translators in its translation services whose job is to translate documents into all the official languages.

As a general rule, translators translate into their mother tongue. However, with the latest enlargements to 27 Member States and the increase in the number of possible language combinations, it is sometimes difficult to find someone able to translate from a given language, especially those that are least widely spoken.

Some low-priority documents are handled externally by freelance translators and they may also be sent for translation to another institution.

Quality and Accuracy
   
Translators in the European Parliament must meet the highest standards of accuracy and precision in their work and ensure consistency with a very large volume of complex legislative documents.

The translation services make effective use of IT resources and the internet to minimise the risk of human error and speed up the production of texts. Large document repositories and reference material are accessed by internet search engines.

Quality and accuracy is essential to ensure a transparent decision-making process, and the key to that is clear and concise original texts and speeches. Revision, checking and supervision guarantees quality and consistency.

Relay System

Direct translation from each official EU language into all the others presents a dilemma. The fact that each official EU language can be translated into 22 others, adds up to a total of 506 possible combinations. So a translation relay system is used.

Documents in less widely spoken languages are first translated into one of the three most commonly used relay languages (English, French or German) and then into other languages.

Simultaneous translation
 
As the range of subjects covered in parliamentary debates is virtually unlimited, an interpreter is required to have good general EU knowledge and expertise in almost all areas of EU activity from sensitive foreign policy issues to types of fish. Simultaneous translation is an extremely complex process, especially during plenary sessions given the limited speaking time allocated to MEPs.
 
Interpretation is provided at the Parliament's three places of work (Brussels, Strasbourg and Luxembourg) and elsewhere, for example for interparliamentary delegations.

Interpreting

Within the European Parliament, interpreters provide a simultaneous oral translation during multilingual meetings or debates.

It is the job of the interpreter to render orally the speeches given by MEPs faithfully and in real time into all the official languages.
   
Whereas translators work with the written word, interpreters are there to ensure that meetings can take place smoothly as if everyone present were speaking the same language.

The European Parliament's Interpreting Directorate employs approximately 350 staff interpreters and has at its disposal a reserve of some 2500 freelance interpreters (auxiliary conference interpreters) whom it calls on very regularly as required to cover its needs.

Between 800 and 1000 interpreters are on hand for the plenary sittings of Parliament, at which simultaneous interpretation is provided from and into all the EU's official languages. For other meetings, interpretation is provided as required.

In principle, each interpreter works into his/her mother tongue out of the original language of the speaker. But with 506 possible language combinations (23 x 22 languages), it is not always easy to find someone who can interpret from a given language into another and in such cases a relay system is used, whereby the interpretation from one language to another passes through a third, the 'pivot' or relay language.

Lawyer linguists

The European Parliament has a team of about 170 lawyer-linguists. It is their job to verify the linguistic and legal quality of the texts and for ensuring the conformity of legal texts in all EU languages.
Lawyer linguists provide Members with information and advice on all theoretical and practical aspects of parliamentary procedures from the initial drafting of texts up to final adoption in plenary.