“I DON'T actually think there’s going to be any MSPs left with Gaelic,” Eilidh Munro recalls thinking when she lost in the contest for the Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch Holyrood seat.
The SNP candidate who had stood in former deputy first minister Kate Forbes’s seat lost to LibDem Andrew Baxter by less than 1000 votes. This was after Alasdair Allan had lost his seat to Labour’s Donald MacKinnon in Na h-Eileanan an Iar – a seat Allan had held since 2007.
Both Allan and Forbes are fluent in the languages, as is Munro.
“It’s a real shame and it does feel like a step backwards,” Munro shares, reflecting on how these seat losses impact the language.
This all comes at a time when every minister in the new Plaid Cymru Cabinet is a fluent Welsh speaker. “Mae cabinet newydd Cymru wedi cynnal eu cyfarfod cyntaf heddiw yn ddwyieithog - gyda chyfieithu ar y pryd yn Gymraeg a Saesneg,” the Welsh Government shared on Monday.
“The new Welsh Cabinet held their first meeting today bilingually – with simultaneous interpretation in Welsh and English.”
Census statistics indicate that 130,161 people in Scotland had some Gaelic skills in 2022, an increase of 43,105 (50%) from 2011.
In the last parliamentary session, Holyrood passed the Scottish Languages Bill, giving Gaelic and Scots new legal status and creating “areas of linguistic significance” where public bodies can be required to do more in the language.
And, the latest Scottish Budget means an increase of an additional £1.8 million in the Gaelic budget for 2026/27 has been confirmed.
However, in practice, the parliament that will now oversee the next phase of that work will do so without a single fluent Gaelic voice on its benches.
More than 20 MSPs chose to swear their oaths or affirmations in languages alongside English – Gaelic among them, but also Scots, Polish, Dutch, Mandarin, Cantonese, British Sign Language and more. One newly elected member became the first ever to take their affirmation in Polish.
Holyrood remains a multilingual space, and Munro welcomes that.
She is also quick to name allies of Gaelic, including Maree Todd, whose mother’s first language was Gaelic and who used the language while she was sworn in.
Greens MSP Ariane Burgess, Labour’s MacKinnon and SNP representatives Emma Roddick and Alison Thewliss also did.
However, Munro points out that while there are still champions of the language, Holyrood has now lost culture and vocabulary, and the “element of it being a community, living language”.
Munro says: “I know that the Parliament’s got a couple of Gaelic officers who will be translating bills into the language and that kind of thing, but they don’t really offer cross-party group support or things like that.
“The amount of Gaelic being used in the building will go down, and that’s really what the focus in protecting and preserving the language needs to be about – encouraging opportunities for use, and opportunities for use in formal and informal settings that aren’t just classrooms. That’s the real challenge.”
Previously, the cross-party parliamentary group for Gaelic could have a Gaelic-speaking convener. School groups from island and Highland communities could tour Holyrood and quiz an MSP entirely in their own language. Now, Munro points out, “any Gaelic primary or high school pupils who come and want to ask an MSP questions – it’s all going to have to be English.”
On the doors, Munro shares that she met elderly speakers who lit up when they realised they could speak to a candidate in Gaelic.
One man in Dingwall, originally from a Hebridean community, was “over the moon” to use the language on his doorstep. Those encounters, she says, were part of what made standing “such a privilege”.
At the same time, the language was a source of contention, but only online.
“There were people that were kind of, ‘Why is she always talking about Gaelic? It’s been in every post,’” she laughs. “I think I’ve mentioned it maybe three times out of hundreds and hundreds.”
“It really does annoy people still, and I think that just shows why it’s so important that we do keep talking about it and highlighting it.”
While the uptick in Gaelic speakers, helped by immersion education and adult learners, is appreciated – the places where Gaelic is still the language of family, gossip and local arguments – remains under pressure.
If those communities go, Munro warns, we don’t just lose fluent speakers. Scotland will also lose the ability to teach the language to new people.
So, what now, in a parliament with no fluent Gaels on the floor but a Languages Act and a multilingual ceremony fresh in the public mind?
Munro stresses that funding has to be “protected and grown”. Councils in Gaelic areas need to designate their linguistic zones and build a “strong network of Gaelic officers” able to create spaces where the language is used in daily life, not just at school, she adds.
And, without champions in the chamber, Gaelic speakers and their allies will have to work harder – writing more emails, lobbying more MSPs, turning up to more consultations – to ensure the promises on paper are realised.
“It’s easy for people to think, ‘Oh, the job’s done, we’ve passed the legislation now,’” she says. “It’s about taking full advantage of that legislation and pushing it as far as it can be pushed… by those who are in Parliament and by councils and by Gaelic speakers themselves.”
Without pressure from inside Holyrood, she worries councils will “lose out on those opportunities that could involve extra funding – which they should be jumping at”.
Reflecting on what is at risk, Munro shares a highlight of her campaign.
“One of the most special things for me was visiting Sabhal Mòr Ostaig in Skye and getting to sit in front of about three different classes of students who all just asked me different political questions, and it was all done in Gaelic.
“It’s so rare that we get the opportunity to discuss all these big issues through the medium of Gaelic, and it felt quite special. It was full on – it was like a hustings but only me in the hot seat – and they asked hard questions, they did not go easy on me.
“But there is something amazing about it just being an hour of being grilled in Gaelic about all these different political issues that were really wide in scope. That was exciting, and I hope, if I was to ever stand again, that that would still be something I could engage with.”
