The Scottish Government need to stop wasting money on Gaelic and sort out our real problems

One of the many confusing signs across the country (source: Wikimedia Commons)

Gaelic is enjoying a sort of revival in Scotland these days. What was once to many of us - certainly in the Glasgow area - a language occasionally heard in Dangermouse ('Donnie Murdo') and crooned by the bearded guy from Dotaman, now seems to have crept into everyday Scottish life.

But while Little Britannia believes it's incredibly important to preserve a culture, we don't want it shoved in our coupons like a leaflet from a pushy sales person, especially if it has absolutely no meaning to us and the vast majority of our fellow Scots.

Despite being spoken by less than 2% of the Scottish population (that's less than the number of people who vote Tory by the way, Big Alex), the Nationalist government seem to think it is justifiable to pump more than £2million into an online Gaelic dictionary. 'Faclair na Gaidhlig' will be a digital database on a par with the Oxford English Dictionary. One question comes to mind: why?

This isn't the first time the SNP-led government has thrown money at waving around the rarely-spoken tongue. They've already wasted cash on the made-up Gaelic names for the many road and station signs around the country. Yes, that is correct. Made-up.

Many of our town and city names were derived from Norse or English and hence, have no Gaelic translation. Rather than take this as a sign (no pun intended), the clever people at the SNP decided to invent their own prose. Like The Goons with their Ying Tong Song, the Scottish Government came up with pretend words that sound like Gaelic. So what we have on all these road and station signs is not even a real language; it's SNP nonsense words which just happen to use the Gaelic alphabet. In other words, gobbledegook. Imagine them all sitting round a table creating this mockery. How do we give Saltcoats a nice Celtic ring to it?

Sure, Gaelic should be available to anyone who wants to learn it. It also makes sense that it appears on signs in the country's Gaelic-speaking regions. But for it to feature at stations in the heart of the lowlands, where it's possible that more people speak Polish than Gaelic, is like plonking a penguin in the middle of the desert. Scotland is not a bilingual country.

Furthermore, a report last year suggested that the English/Gaelic road signs could confuse foreign drivers, and might even cause accidents.

Scottish Gaelic is about as relevant to Little Britannia - and no doubt many other Scots - as Ancient Greek. We were born in Scotland but have strong English roots and, going by our recent ancestry (ie, our grandparents and great-grandparents), it would be more relevant for us to learn Welsh, Irish or Yiddish - or, if rumours about our great-grandmother are to be believed, one of the many Romani languages. Should taxpayers foot the bill if we say it is our right to learn one of these? We might be in a minority with regards to the Gypsy language, but then aren't the Gaelic speakers?

Little Britannia doesn't just speak for ourselves here. Today's Scot is not the Scot of 700 years ago. The Scotland of 2014 is part of a small island rich in different cultures, mixed by centuries of immigration and conquering invasions. We are not much different from our brothers and sisters in the rest of the UK and to suggest otherwise is somewhat concerning.

The proportion of people in Scotland with English surnames and the number of Mcs and Macs south of the border speak for themselves. (By the way, the name Salmond is apparently of Anglo-Saxon origin; whilst his 'English nemesis' David Cameron can claim descent from Scottish Freedom Fighters at Bannockburn. Bet that news went down well at the Bute House dinner table).

We are not, as many of the more hardcore separatists appear to promote, in a constant game of 'the Scots versus the English'. Many Scots today could have as much (or more Little Britannia's case) of an ancestral connection with the Norman Language than they do with Gaelic, yet still our taxes are being used to wallpaper parts of the country with made-up words and to create a costly online dictionary, while our public services are stretched.

We have no doubt that there are enough passionate people in Scotland to keep Gaelic alive without the government's dangerous nationalist agenda and reckless spending.The SNP need to stop throwing money at resurrecting a rarely-spoken language and trust the 58,000 or so Gaelic speakers to pass it on themselves.

All we can say is that if the Scottish Government can make up their own Gaelic-sounding words and phrases, then we can too: "O'or càsh 'can-be be'tter sp'ent."