Brussels, October, 23, 1995

Dear member,

As you will undoubtedly have seen from your work as a member of the European Parliament, Europe is faced increasingly with the problem of communication: both with regard to the functioning of its institutions and with regard to the life of its citizens.

The first aspect of the issue has considerable effects on the finances of the Union, and therefore on the citizens/tax-payers, accounting up to now for over 40% of total expenditure (with a peak of 60% for the Court of Justice). Moreover, despite the establishment of the single market, freedom of movement (and therefore of work) is still relatively limited, especially for the less well-off, and will remain so until the Union provides itself with an efficient instrument of communication, easily accessible to those who do not have a high-school diploma or university degree.

This is how things stand as a further, powerful competitor of the European Union is about to emerge with the constitution, planned for 2005, of the market of the two Americas. Unlike its European equivalent, the American market will have great opportunities for development and labour mobility as a result of the fact that it covers an area in which only two main languages, English and Spanish, are spoken.

It is true, we must admit, that English is tending to assume the role of a European and international lingua franca. This phenomenon, however, is not as neutral as many people would have us believe. One possible solution would be to choose English (rather than being the passive witness of its predominance, as happens today). But this would, in our opinion, create enormous risks. In particular, it would confirm the inequality between native speakers and non-native speakers, between those who speak the English of Shakespeare (a tiny minority outside the UK and Eire) and those who speak the English of airline pilots (the vast majority outside the UK and Eire).

For these reasons, and for many others (we will be happy to provide anyone who is interested with university research papers on the subject), we believe the time has come to include the issue of communication and linguistic democracy on the agenda of Europe, above all of its institutions. This could be done by immediately proposing Esperanto as the lingua franca for translations and interpreting, and as the reference language in the judicial sphere, and then, at a later date, by dealing with the issue of the introduction of the study of Esperanto as a second language in all schools throughout the EU.

In order to begin to gather together those who believe that this is a serious problem that must be dealt with urgently, we are sending you the text of an appeal, which we hope you will sign as soon as possible and return to us by fax (2849198 or 2849197). We would also invite you to draw up a brief statement (as some of your colleagues in the European Parliament, pressed by our Esperantist friends, have already done) underlining how important it is to face up to the issue of language.

In the hope that you will help us to draw the attention of the general public and the European institutions to this pressing issue, we extend our best wishes.

Giorgio PAGANO Olivier DUPUIS

Secretary of the Secretary of the

Radical Esperanto Association Radical Party