WHEN I was at school, we were taught the 'mother tongue' is the language of the country in which you were born and as the Asian children in our schools were born in Darwen and Blackburn, English is their 'mother tongue.'

While I agree they should be taught about their ethnic background and its cultures, its language should be taught in the mosques and only spoken in their homes.

As we are a multi-cultured area, are the council going to pay for a French teacher or German teacher - two languages taught in most of our schools? I think not!

So what makes Urdu, Punjabi and Gujerati so different?

The council keep asking for racial harmony but it is acts like this which cause discord.

Why the council lean so much to the Asians and neglect English and other nationalities beats me. In 1947, a large number of Polish and Ukranian people came to live in this country and settled in various towns.

When their children were old enough to go to school, did they ask for or get a language teacher paid for by a grant? No, they did not.

The Ukranians had a house in Mill Lane which was a social club downstairs and had classrooms upstairs. It was here that the children had to go every Saturday morning to learn the language of their parents and that language was spoken all the time at home.

The Polish people did the same.

Think again, councillors, you represent all voters, irrespective of race, colour or creed.

W G, Roe Lee Park, Blackburn.

HAVING read (LET, July 25) about the row over Blackburn Council's grant to mosques to teach youngsters in their 'mother tongue,' I think this is a complete waste of money and a farce.

Most of the children speak in the language of their parents outside of school anyway.

And I feel if the children wish to learn the traditions and cultures of their former homelands, parents should spend time teaching them.

After all, there seems to be very few of the older Asian women who speak English.

I also agree that money allocated for education should benefit all schools.

JEAN RILEY (Mrs), Cedar Street, Accrington.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.