TfW language policy

[urbophile]

About a year ago I travelled from Liverpool to Chester via Runcorn on a Transport for Wales service. My (very possibly faulty) memory tells me that the automated PA announcements were entirely in Welsh. That is unlikely and I suppose they were made in both languages, although I think the Welsh ones preceded the English. Since it is the Welsh national rail company that is unsurprising and as it ought to be, except that this particular service runs entirely through English territory.

But today I travelled on the Borderlands Line between Bidston and Wrexham. For more than half its journey this train travels through Wales, and yet every single announcement was in English only. On the return journey there were no announcements at all until we reached England. Then the approach to each station was announced by a male voice in Welsh, followed after a long pause with a female voice giving the English translation. In some cases the English announcement ('This is xxx') was delayed until the train was actually leaving the station.

Compare this with the extremely punctilious approach of Belgian railways, where the language used depends on which language community the train happens to be in at the moment. Does TfW actually have a policy or does it depend on the whim of the conductor, the software programmer, or who?

 

[Parallel]

In short, it’s just down to the PIS system fitted to the trains.

TfW’s newer trains (and refurbished MK4 sets) use systems which are capable of bilingual announcements. The issue here is that at stations where trains have short dwells, there won’t be time to get through the Welsh and the English announcements.

The units that make English only announcements use systems that were retrofitted to older trains which previously had no PIS system, to meet PRM requirements. These trains generally work between Birmingham International and Aberystwyth/Pwllheli/Holyhead; some of the Borderlands services; the Heart of Wales services; local services throughout the Welsh Valleys and some other routes, but many of these trains will be replaced by newer stock in the coming years.

At stations, TfW are more consistent, with their English stations using English announcements only, and Welsh stations using Welsh and English. I assume it is more difficult to program the trains by geography, and I’d imagine the TrainFX system fitted to the older stock is probably not capable of bilingual announcements.

 

[thenorthern]

The main law regarding the use of Welsh is the Welsh Language Act 1993 which says that Welsh and English should be treated equally by public bodies. I know that the Welsh Language Act didn't apply to Arriva Trains Wales, Wales and Borders or Wales and West as they were private companies and not public bodies per say. Given that Transport for Wales is state owned I am not sure if it applies to TfW.

 

[WestCoast]

They just need better PIS/software onboard their trains, SBB in Switzerland handles this perfectly with services crossing language borders reversing the order of French/German/Italian announcements in different areas etc even having auto announcements about catering and disruption doing the same.

Ideally, the TfW 197s wouldn’t be doing Welsh first when e.g. approaching Runcorn or East Didsbury but it’s unlikely to cause a diplomatic incident like doing an announcement in French in the wrong part of Belgium.

 

[yorkie]

They just need better PIS/software onboard their trains, SBB in Switzerland handles this perfectly with services crossing language borders reversing the order of French/German/Italian announcements in different areas etc even having auto announcements about catering and disruption doing the same.

Ideally, the TfW 197s wouldn’t be doing Welsh first when e.g. approaching Runcorn or East Didsbury but it’s unlikely to cause a diplomatic incident like doing an announcement in French in the wrong part of Belgium.

I can't see any sort of pragmatic approach being adopted, sadly.

If the SBB approach was adopted, then places like Cardiff would see English spoken first. I can't see certain politicians allowing TfW to do that.

 

[merry]

Talking with a Dutch rail industry customer recently (after travelling via Belgium), I was informed that Belgian trains have strict operational language rules: a radio/phone conversation  must begin in the defined language for that area (French or Flemish). If both parties agree they can switch to a mutually agreed language to continue - could be French, Flemish, English, German, or whatever if both parties are happy.
Announcememts are generally bilingual, trilingual or quadrilingual on intercity services if appropriate (list as above) and the hardware or staff can do it - all will do 2 languages, most add English, a few do more.
Would that Welsh trains could consistently manage just two languages...

 

[Russel]

I meant to post about this in the 197 thread last month and totally forgot.

I did a day around North Wales in April, Coast Line, Conwy Valley etc, all on 197s and the first 197 I got leaving Chester heading towards the coast failed to play the English part of the "This train is for" announcement on leaving Chester and again on leaving one of the stations along the coast, yet every other announcement was as it should be.

Cant remember the unit number but it was one with the standard plus section.

 

[Envoy]

The main law regarding the use of Welsh is the Welsh Language Act 1993 which says that Welsh and English should be treated equally by public bodies. I know that the Welsh Language Act didn't apply to Arriva Trains Wales, Wales and Borders or Wales and West as they were private companies and not public bodies per say. Given that Transport for Wales is state owned I am not sure if it applies to TfW.

The English language is not treated equally by TFW as they write it second on signage and always make the Welsh text bolder. Announcements in Wales are always in Welsh first despite the fact that no more than 18% of the population of Wales can understand Welsh. (I had to run like hell last week because of a last minute platform switch with the train pulling in on another platform by the time it got to the English announcement).

TFW talk the talk about being an Equal Opportunity employer yet for those jobs where they don’t say that Welsh is essential, they put this:> "The ability to speak/write Welsh would make a great addition to your application, but it is not essential for this role.” So, in other words, all things being equal, they are more likely to give the Welsh speaker the job. That discriminates against 82% of the population of Wales.

The present Welsh Government have a policy of increasing the number of Welsh speakers yet nobody asked the people of Wales whether they wanted to learn Welsh. Imagine if 18% of the population of England could speak Cornish and they then forced the other 82% of the people of England to learn Cornish and favoured them for getting jobs.

 

[RedKing]

The English language is not treated equally by TFW as they write it second on signage and always make the Welsh text bolder. Announcements in Wales are always in Welsh first despite the fact that no more than 18% of the population of Wales can understand Welsh. (I had to run like hell last week because of a last minute platform switch with the train pulling in on another platform by the time it got to the English announcement).

TFW talk the talk about being an Equal Opportunity employer yet for those jobs where they don’t say that Welsh is essential, they put this:> "The ability to speak/write Welsh would make a great addition to your application, but it is not essential for this role.” So, in other words, all things being equal, they are more likely to give the Welsh speaker the job. That discriminates against 82% of the population of Wales.

The present Welsh Government have a policy of increasing the number of Welsh speakers yet nobody asked the people of Wales whether they wanted to learn Welsh. Imagine if 18% of the population of England could speak Cornish and they then forced the other 82% of the people of England to learn Cornish and favoured them for getting jobs.

You're complaining about Wales encouraging use of their own language??

Signs & announcements in Wales should be in Welsh first. You're in Wales.

There's nothing discriminatory about saying speaking Welsh would be a great addition. It says itself, not essential. Any job application has a list of essential and desirable.

Yes, the Welsh government should be increasing the use of the Welsh language. It is part of its culture. The long-term decrease of its usage is as a result of us, English-speaking people, moving in and refusing to embrace other cultures...

Your comparison to Cornwall is off, it's a very distinct region as is Wales. They are attempting to encourage the use of Cornish / Kernow in Cornwall. (https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20230423-why-cornwall-is-resurrecting-its-indigenous-language)

Seems to be a weird and very bitter take you've got there. And absolutely nothing to do with the railways and the OPs query which was quite specific to language policy on TFW.

 

[Meerkat]

How many Welsh people really use the Welsh equivalents for English places? Was watching Welsh football (in Welsh) once and it was fun reading the scrolling score updates and trying to guess where they were.
Im not talking about places of historically murky Welsh v Englishness but places like Exeter.

 

[Adsy125]

About 3% of TfW customers choose to use Welsh over English when interacting with the company.

You asked us…
1. I would like to enquire about language choices on your on-train WiFi, where it
exists. Can I ask for what proportion of passengers request English when presented
with the language choice, and what proportion choose Welsh?
2. Furthermore, if you hold the data, can I ask what percentage of customer service
queries and dealt with in Welsh and what percentage are in English?
RESPONSE
Question 1
The percentage of people who selected Welsh in the Financial year 2024/25 was 3.15% with the
remaining 96.85 selecting English.
Question 2
TfW Phone calls 24/25 (all TfW Rail calls) – 96.47% English 3.53% Welsh
For written queries, we cannot see individual cases language. However, from the contact
preferences of the active contacts 23% of those have requested Welsh Language

 

[mmh]

The English language is not treated equally by TFW as they write it second on signage and always make the Welsh text bolder. Announcements in Wales are always in Welsh first despite the fact that no more than 18% of the population of Wales can understand Welsh. (I had to run like hell last week because of a last minute platform switch with the train pulling in on another platform by the time it got to the English announcement).

And that's absolutely fine, as the legislation is not that the languages must be treated "equally", but that Welsh must not be treated "less favourably." In practice that means Welsh must be written or spoken first, of course.

I find it a little odd how widespread the "equally" misunderstanding is, but I will be more than a little biased as a large part of my job is applying the legislation. Who can understand Welsh and where they live is irrelevant to complying with it.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

You're complaining about Wales encouraging use of their own language??

Signs & announcements in Wales should be in Welsh first. You're in Wales.

There's nothing discriminatory about saying speaking Welsh would be a great addition. It says itself, not essential. Any job application has a list of essential and desirable.

Yes, the Welsh government should be increasing the use of the Welsh language. It is part of its culture. The long-term decrease of its usage is as a result of us, English-speaking people, moving in and refusing to embrace other cultures...

Your comparison to Cornwall is off, it's a very distinct region as is Wales. They are attempting to encourage the use of Cornish / Kernow in Cornwall. (https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20230423-why-cornwall-is-resurrecting-its-indigenous-language)

Seems to be a weird and very bitter take you've got there. And absolutely nothing to do with the railways and the OPs query which was quite specific to language policy on TFW.

Probably the most sanctimonious thing I’ve read all day.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 May 2025 ==

About 3% of TfW customers choose to use Welsh over English when interacting with the company.

It’s laughable.

 

[WirralLine]

The class 230s are staying longer than most other stock which have non bi-lingual announcements, apparently there is a way to make it work but isn't straight forward, but will happen eventually.

Regarding above comments of 197s not announcing everything they should, the PIS is a bit glitchy. Sometimes they announce "we are now arriving at" in both languages but fail to announce the name of the station. It'll do this for "we are travelling to" also. It is an easy solution- trip and reset the PIS, but this in turn knocks out the ASDO system usually so takes a few minutes to reset everything and set it all back up. Better left alone I find.

 

[krus_aragon]

How many Welsh people really use the Welsh equivalents for English places? Was watching Welsh football (in Welsh) once and it was fun reading the scrolling score updates and trying to guess where they were.
Im not talking about places of historically murky Welsh v Englishness but places like Exeter.

It varies a lot, mainly by the significance of the place, and/or proximity to the border.

The likes of Manchester, Shrewsbury, Bristol, Chester, London, York, Oxford, Cambridge, Liverpool, Edinburgh have Welsh names that are commonly used.

Exeter, Salisbury, Worcester, Carlisle, have Welsh names, but I'd guess more Welsh speakers people use the English name than the Welsh, due to lack of familiarity with the Welsh name. (These places tend to be further from Wales, and are places with cathedrals or places with significance in old Welsh/Brythonic history.)

And then there's places like Birmingham that are definitely big, but somehow haven't picked up a Welsh name over the years.

 

[RedKing]

God forbid a country / government tries to embrace its history.
I've not seen any (recent) complaints about bi-lingualism in Scotland?
Same people complaining about this are probably the same to complain about people moving to England and not 'emerging themselves in our culture'. Always expect others to bend to them

 

[62484GlenLyon]

Another question for the Welsh speakers please - can you enlighten me why I have seen on the PIS on the mk4 sets trains heading to Manchester shown as Fanceinion, not Manceinion, and Cardiff as Gaerdydd, not Caerdydd. Also, in checking the spellings for this message I see that the new edition of the TfW West Wales to Swansea and Cardiff timetable (at least this tt, I haven't checked any others) shows Caerdydd as Chaerdydd.

 

[Meerkat]

God forbid a country / government tries to embrace its history.
I've not seen any (recent) complaints about bi-lingualism in Scotland?
Same people complaining about this are probably the same to complain about people moving to England and not 'emerging themselves in our culture'. Always expect others to bend to them

The Scottish bi-lingualism is absolutely bonkers outside the far reaches. At least Welsh is the indigenous language of all Wales AIUI.
I personally, as an outsider, think forcing areas where almost no one speaks Welsh to have Welsh road names and Welsh place names is a bit silly. I like simplicity - just have a residents vote and pick one (I reckon that the Welsh one would get picked more than main language would suggest, particularly when it’s just a spelling issue).
I also think there should be better differentiation on signs. A lot of effort goes into making signs quick to read for safety reasons, which is undone if it takes time just to work out which bit you can understand.

 

[urbophile]

Another question for the Welsh speakers please - can you enlighten me why I have seen on the PIS on the mk4 sets trains heading to Manchester shown as Fanceinion, not Manceinion, and Cardiff as Gaerdydd, not Caerdydd. Also, in checking the spellings for this message I see that the new edition of the TfW West Wales to Swansea and Cardiff timetable (at least this tt, I haven't checked any others) shows Caerdydd as Chaerdydd.

Mutation. A complicated grammatical rule that, I presume, native Welsh speakers do automatically but learners like me are still no nearer understanding. Makes life interesting!

 

[62484GlenLyon]

Mutation. A complicated grammatical rule that, I presume, native Welsh speakers do automatically but learners like me are still no nearer understanding. Makes life interesting!

Thanks for that. When I first saw Fanceinion and Gaerdydd I wondered if it was due to a gremin in the software on the mk4s but I have seen it enough now to realise that those spellings were linguistically correct.

Referring to my previous post I have now checked all the new TfW timetables. It is only the West Wales to Swansea and Cardiff timetable that shows Caerdydd as Chaerdydd so I wonder if this is a mistake that escaped the proofreader.

 

[Lewisham2221]

About 3% of TfW customers choose to use Welsh over English when interacting with the company.

Conveniently ignoring the 23% (which you clearly included in your quote) who have requested Welsh as their language preference when receiving correspondence from TfW.

About 3% selecting Welsh when logging into the onboard WiFi - IIRC there's only one further button press required to connect, regardless of language choice, so it doesn't really make much difference...

About 3% chose Welsh when contacting TfW by telephone, but there are no figures available for written contacts.

So it's probably more likely to be somewhere between 3% and 23%...

 

[Towers]

The priority when providing essential information in a functional environment like public transport should be accessibility. 3% of people getting in touch with TfW speak welsh. The overwhelming majority of the other 97%, despite the absolutely hurclean efforts of the government, will speak english. If there is limited time to make an announcement about something on a TfW train or station then it should be in english, as there will be many, many more english speakers who don’t speak welsh than vice versa. If there is sufficient time for niceties then by all means include secondary languages, but the priority needs to be communicating clearly and effectively and that means sensible use of language.

This is not about pride or vanity, this is a place for providing simple information in as a clear a form as possible. Basic stuff.

 

[ThirteenArches]

At least Welsh is the indigenous language of all Wales

Welsh, or at least a very similar language (Brythonic), was the indigenous language of England and Scotland too before the Saxons (and Angles and Jutes) arrived. Gaelic landed in Scotland around the same time, so Gaelic has at least the same status as an indigenous language of Scotland as English does. The Brythonic there died out a long time ago.

As a monoglot English speaker, I can understand why people who think of themselves as Welsh would want to keep identity markers. Just as we persist in speaking English English of various flavours (somewhat rubbed- out South East Lancashire in my own case) when the rest of the world has prioritised American English.

But I also remember, over 40 years ago, a ferry in a Gaeltacht area of Ireland being operated entirely in Irish. A friend who lives in the area tells me that it is still MOSTLY done in Irish, but if they really want to be sure a message has got across (like coordinating actions when docking in an Atlantic storm), English is used.

At least we're not Belgians.

 

[Towers]

Welsh, or at least a very similar language (Brythonic), was the indigenous language of England and Scotland too before the Saxons (and Angles and Jutes) arrived. Gaelic landed in Scotland around the same time, so Gaelic has at least the same status as an indigenous language of Scotland as English does. The Brythonic there died out a long time ago.

As a monoglot English speaker, I can understand why people who think of themselves as Welsh would want to keep identity markers. Just as we persist in speaking English English of various flavours (somewhat rubbed- out South East Lancashire in my own case) when the rest of the world has prioritised American English.

But I also remember, over 40 years ago, a ferry in a Gaeltacht area of Ireland being operated entirely in Irish. A friend who lives in the area tells me that it is still MOSTLY done in Irish, but if they really want to be sure a message has got across (like coordinating actions when docking in an Atlantic storm), English is used.

At least we're not Belgians.

And then you have french air traffic controllers!

 

[tfw756rider]

Another question for the Welsh speakers please - can you enlighten me why I have seen on the PIS on the mk4 sets trains heading to Manchester shown as Fanceinion, not Manceinion, and Cardiff as Gaerdydd, not Caerdydd. Also, in checking the spellings for this message I see that the new edition of the TfW West Wales to Swansea and Cardiff timetable (at least this tt, I haven't checked any others) shows Caerdydd as Chaerdydd.

Mutation. A complicated grammatical rule that, I presume, native Welsh speakers do automatically but learners like me are still no nearer understanding. Makes life interesting!

Exactly, the same reason 197120 says "Gwnaed yng Nghymru" on its livery additions (Cymru becomes Nghymru).

I believe the number five (pump) can be pump, fump or bump (pronounced like an English "pimp", "vimp" or "bim(p)") depending on what sentence it's in.

 

[urbophile]

Exactly, the same reason 197120 says "Gwnaed yng Nghymru" on its livery additions (Cymru becomes Nghymru).

I believe the number five (pump) can be pump, fump or bump (pronounced like an English "pimp", "fimp" or "bimp") depending on what sentence it's in.

'vimp' (single f sounds like English v). In some cases the final p can be omitted, so 'bum'!

 

[vicbury]

The English language is not treated equally by TFW as they write it second on signage and always make the Welsh text bolder. Announcements in Wales are always in Welsh first despite the fact that no more than 18% of the population of Wales can understand Welsh. (I had to run like hell last week because of a last minute platform switch with the train pulling in on another platform by the time it got to the English announcement).

I'm not particularly bothered by announcements being made in Welsh first. It's not the most customer friendly but urgent announcements are usually made manually in English. The trains making announcements in Welsh whilst in England is a bit annoying but thankfully they've drastically cut down the announcements on the 197s.

I do however agree that the use of bold text for Welsh and normal (or even greyed out or less saturated) text for English is visually irritating and borders on illegible at times. Particularly bad in timetable booklets where there is a sea of bold and normal text. You would think their graphic designers could come up with a more elegant solution.

 

[Parallel]

Thanks for that. When I first saw Fanceinion and Gaerdydd I wondered if it was due to a gremin in the software on the mk4s but I have seen it enough now to realise that those spellings were linguistically correct.

As an example, you can have Penarth, Benarth, Phenarth or Mhenarth depending on the mutation.

Chaerdydd and Gaerdydd are both valid depending when used for Caerdydd.

So at Cardiff Central, you hear “Y trên nesaf i gyrraedd platfform 8 bydd y gwasanaeth Trafnidiaeth Cymru i Benarth. Ym galw yn Grangetown, Dingle Road a Phenarth.”

 

[DelW]

God forbid a country / government tries to embrace its history.
I've not seen any (recent) complaints about bi-lingualism in Scotland?

The Scottish bi-lingualism is absolutely bonkers outside the far reaches. At least Welsh is the indigenous language of all Wales AIUI.
I personally, as an outsider, think forcing areas where almost no one speaks Welsh to have Welsh road names and Welsh place names is a bit silly. I like simplicity - just have a residents vote and pick one (I reckon that the Welsh one would get picked more than main language would suggest, particularly when it’s just a spelling issue).

My late partner, who was from Fife and was very proud of her Scots ancestry, was absolutely incensed by the policy of applying Gaelic names to public buildings and other properties (including railway stations) in her home area, which hadn't been Gaelic-speaking in anyone's memory. She considered it a deliberately provocative policy by the SNP.

It's just as well she was never stopped by the police when driving, she'd almost certainly have berated them for having "Poileas" on their car and their uniforms and possibly ended up under arrest!

 

[Adsy125]

Conveniently ignoring the 23% (which you clearly included in your quote) who have requested Welsh as their language preference when receiving correspondence from TfW.

About 3% selecting Welsh when logging into the onboard WiFi - IIRC there's only one further button press required to connect, regardless of language choice, so it doesn't really make much difference...

About 3% chose Welsh when contacting TfW by telephone, but there are no figures available for written contacts.

So it's probably more likely to be somewhere between 3% and 23%...

I didn't think the 23% tells you much which is mostly why I ignored it. It's a bit like British people who have their phones set to French or Spanish to help them learn it, it really reflects people who'd like to learn Welsh, or would like to practice as well as those who use it as their primary language. The 3% is the language people actually use when they want to communicate something or just by muscle memory. It takes effort to pick English on the WiFi because it's the second option.

I strongly agree that Welsh should be available for people communicating with TfW, receiving correspondence etc. there's no reason not to and it's good to make Welsh available to people who would like to use it.

However, for things like announcements it becomes a bit dogmatic to make some very long announcements in Welsh only before acknowledging the English only speaking majority. Given that the number of people who only speak Welsh is negligible, what we be the disadvantage in changing the order of the announcement slightly. Instead of the whole announcement being in Welsh first, what about "The next train on Platform 1 will be the xx:xx to Cardiff Central" but in Welsh, repeating that in English, then doing the station calls in Welsh and then English. You still respect the legislation, while providing much better information for a majority of travellers.

Edit: I had a similar experience recently to someone above, where the Welsh announcement and Llandudno Junction was so long, and triggered quite late, that anyone only speaking English would've missed the train. Luckily there was a manual intervention and the announcement was made in English, but if the staff member wasn't around then people could've missed that train.