Policy
HRH Duke of Edinburgh, 10 June 1921 to 9 April 2021 Read more
Policy
We worked with Deaf communities across Scotland to develop the British Sign Language (BSL): National Plan 2017 to 2023, which was published in October 2017.
The plan sets out the steps we will take between 2017 and 2023 to achieve our overall vision: to make Scotland the best place in the world to live, work and visit for people whose first or preferred language is BSL.
We ran a consultation on a draft BSL National Plan and published an analysis of consultation responses in early 2017.
Now that the National Plan is published, listed authorities including local authorities, territorial NHS boards and universities and colleges must publish their own BSL plans by October 2018.
The British Sign Language (Scotland) Act 2015 came into force in October 2015. It promotes the use of BSL in Scotland, primarily by requiring certain authorities to develop BSL plans that outline how they will promote and raise awareness of the language.
We set up the BSL National Advisory Group (NAG) to represent the views of people with BSL as their first or preferred language.
The BSL NAG – which is made up of BSL users and public bodies – is helping to inform the development of the BSL National Plan.
We created the Deaf Sector Partnership (DSP) to support early implementation of the BSL (Scotland) Act. The DSP is made up of five delivery partners:
Voluntary Action Fund (VAF) provides support and monitoring for the DSP.
From 2015 to 2017 we allocated nearly £900,000 via DSP members to: