Educational Trips and Exchanges

Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston Excerpts

Thursday 25th April 2024 Grand Committee

[Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston (CB)]

My Lords, I am extremely grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, for this opportunity, but there is a tinge of sadness about it, because what I am about to say, I would probably have been able to say five, 10 or 15 years ago. That is in relation to foreign languages in general and, if I might be forgiven for focusing on one language, to German, my first language, in particular.

More than 50 years ago, Willy Brandt, the then German Chancellor, observed:

“If I am selling to you, I speak your language. If I am buying, dann müssen sie Deutsch sprechen”.


That was true then and it is still true today. However, foreign languages are about far more than just economics, although we should not underestimate that economics is essential. While English language speakers have an initial advantage, they are very often overlooked when it comes to deeper relationships, particularly in export markets: you do have to speak the language well, and there is a sense of sadness on my part that even the Foreign Office, when it recruits its diplomats, does not particularly value their language skills as part of the recruitment process.

I want to quote the German ambassador, Miguel Berger, who observed in January this year that just 2,210 students sat German A-level in 2023, a drop of 17% on the previous year and a fall of almost 48% since 2013. He called that

“a truly dramatic decline, which is deeply worrying especially as it is an ongoing trend”.

I have to say that in all my time of meeting a succession of German ambassadors, each of them starts off by saying that it is their mission to ensure that more students learn German—and by the end of their term, fewer of them do.

It is worth looking at teaching, particularly for a language such as German, which is perceived to be a difficult one. If I compare it with the way that English is taught in Germany, years 4 and 5 there would probably spend about five hours a week focusing on one language to gain confidence and the joy of it, whereas here we spend only about two hours—maybe sometimes three. I urge the Minister to focus on the amount of teaching hours that we have on one language.

The second thing worth looking at, when we compare the British Council’s latest statements on international engagement, is that there has been an increase in schools doing online digital links with schools outside the UK. In 2023, some 14% did that, so even if we cannot encourage the travel, there is that sense of curiosity and eagerness to learn. I urge the Minister to look at that and encourage digital engagement to create that curiosity and interest in learning languages.