SOME LESS CLEAR-CUT CLAIMS FOR LANGUAGE DISCRIMINATION

It's not in the interests of any business to turn customers away, is it?

But even if a business had someone on the door, turning away people who didn't speak English, it would be no more discriminatory than denying the right to Slovene lessons on grounds of speaking English, like Ljudska Univerza Ptuj. Or prohibiting English speakers, with all their competitive advantages, from participating in the economy as a sole proprietor, which is the explicit and incontrovertible intention of ZJRS 14.

By its own boast, Slovenia's 41% who cannot do any English is a minority after all.

Consider how this interfaces culturally with such explanations as "Because it's Ptuj" or "You don't need it anyway as you speak English". "You sound funny." Or most usefully of all, "Your Slovene sounds Czech."

Unlike in Groener v. Minister for Education, no organised effort has been made to promote or disseminate the language. It's exactly the opposite - its mechanisms are a secret, evidently to varying extents to the autochthons as well.

In Ministère Public v. Mutsch the ECJ came to the decision that permission to use one's own language in court should be considered to be a social advantage to which all EC workers are entitled according to regulation 1612/68. This entitlement should also extend to EC workers and their families in countries other than their own. Equality required that EC workers and their families should be afforded the same linguistic rights as State's own citizens. Therefore, the Court found, Mr. Mutsch had been discriminated against.

Accordingly the present Complainant was an EC worker until the UK's withdrawal from the EU on 31 January 2020.

Regulation 1612/68 [33] was in force from 1968 until 15/06/2011, covering the first six years of the Complainant's residence as an EU member citizen.

It was replaced by Regulation 492/2011 [34],

and the consolidated version of 01/08/21 [35]:

wherein Article 3(1) explains:

Article 3

1. Under this Regulation, provisions laid down by law, regulation or administrative action or administrative practices of a Member State shall not apply:
(a)
where they limit application for and offers of employment, or the right of foreign nationals to take up and pursue employment or subject these to conditions not applicable in respect of their own nationals; or

(b)
where, though applicable irrespective of nationality, their exclusive or principal aim or effect is to keep nationals of other Member States away from the employment offered.

The first subparagraph shall not apply to conditions relating to linguistic knowledge required by reason of the nature of the post to be filled.

"by reason of the nature of the post to be filled" is the critical feature here. Pointing www.bank.si's domain name to your DNS as a company is illegal. Pointing it to your DNS as an employee is not a crime as it appears the Complainant has met no client, Slovenian or otherwise.

The work performed is exactly the same. The nature of the post therefore does not require Slovenian linguistic knowledge as implied by ZJRS 14 and is prevented in any case despite ZJRS 13.

From the point of view of Slovenia it does not seem Brexit has made any difference to this. English is still an official language of the EU.

Its "minority" has been increased EU-wide, but has locally remained the same. Slovenians have learned it, but have no one to talk to. Prolonged serious speaking of English among themselves might feel pretentious - but the injection of one Anglophone into the group is enough to permit the abandonment of Slovene altogether, very often.

The majority is bowing to the minority. Four people are saving €120 an hour, they can gripe about how the foreigner didn't learn Slovene after he has gone. Nor are his chances of learning Slovene improved by being outnumbered.

Doubts circle around the protocols. Nobody quite knows what to think. Clearly, expecting your foreigner not to speak Slovene is cognitively consonant with your imaginary €30 gain.

These two groups, the simulacrum English speakers untouched by foreign hands, and the original, are each engaged in an asymmetric struggle to get the other's language.

Interesting also in view of the scientific evidence on language acquisition is Article 6(1):

"1. The engagement and recruitment of a national of one Member State for a post in another Member State shall not depend on medical, vocational or other criteria which are discriminatory on grounds of nationality by comparison with those applied to nationals of the other Member State who wish to pursue the same activity."

- with your attention drawn to "medical, vocational or other criteria". Never having been a Slovenian fetus is a medical criterion; vocationally, the language choices at school were French, and then German or Latin. The unhelpful Zeitgeist of Slovenia's fait accompli quod erat demonstrandum.

In Angonese v Casa di Risparmio di Bolzano the

"Court held that Article 48 (now Art. 39) could actually be invoked against private persons. They also held that the bank's requirement of the possession of a certificate which was obtainable in only one province was lawful if it was based on objective reasons and if it was proportional to the aim which was being pursued. Referring back to Groener, the Court held that a member state could not require that language ability be acquired in the member state concerned and therefore, it was disproportionate not to accept proof of linguistic knowledge from outside that member state." [36]

Whereas in the present case the language certificate could not reasonably be acquired even in the area of the member state. The nearest plausible textbook on Slovene grammar in English is from Kansas [63]. Slovene could perhaps be acquired outside the area at disproportionately high expense.

In Vizgirda v. Slovenia [47] the Constitutional Court rejected the District Court’s view that a defendant who was in custody and who had used a certain language in oral proceedings should also submit written submissions in that language, finding that written communication required a higher level of language proficiency. The Constitutional Court noted that the applicant had been assisted by a Russian interpreter in the first-instance proceedings, which had mainly involved oral communication. After an appeal, proceedings were typically in writing and the accused no longer benefited from the assistance of court-appointed counsel. The Constitutional Court therefore found that the applicant, who had explained in his submissions to the Supreme Court that he could not write in Russian, should be allowed to submit them in his own language. It therefore concluded that the court below had violated the applicant’s right to use his own language in the proceedings, as explicitly provided for by section 8 of the Criminal Procedure Act and as guaranteed by Article 62 of the Constitution. [47]

This contrasts with the present situation where the Complainant, given internet access, has a better chance of interpreting text than oral Slovene, and lives in a dialect zone of uncertain scope and relevance.

In Griffin v Hyder Brothers Ltd 2012, Mr Griffin was a supervisor at a petrol station, which was taken over by the Hyder Brothers. Two of Mr Griffin’s colleagues, including Mr Hyder, the owner, often spoke to each other in Urdu or Punjabi in Mr Griffin’s presence and referenced his name but he couldn't understand the rest of what they were saying. This made Mr Griffin feel uncomfortable and excluded and so he brought a claim for discrimination and harassment. Mr Griffin was unsuccessful in his claim because:

There was no clear evidence that anything derogatory had been said about him by those speaking in Punjabi and Urdu.

No other aggravating factors existed, such as an intention to exclude, upset or humiliate Mr Griffin at work.

A hostile environment had not been created and the number of incidents had been found by the Tribunal to have been exaggerated by Mr Griffin.

Two people running a business would be required to discuss employees by name and it would be reasonable to do this in their first language, if it was easier for both parties to the conversation.

This case does not however, preclude discrimination or harassment claims being successful on different facts when a foreign language is used by staff in front of others who do not understand that language. [37]

The situation is analagous insofar that Slovenians whose English understanding is limited or absent may feel the same way as Mr Griffin.

But this is a two-way street. Unlike Mr Griffin the gruff population, whose understanding of private, public, and personal space is mixed, may feel that this is going too far on their territory, which is why the Complainant has retreated indoors.

It is non-analogous in that a hostile environment has been created [76], and the Slovenians are on the whole much better equipped to know when the Complainant is being derogatory to them in English than is the Complainant if they do so in Slovene. Which they have proceeded to use to their advantage like jealous peasants.

Only the sense of humour needed to do it with any panache is missing.

This lack may reflect their general salience of the world as filtered through the Slovenian mainstream media space and language. It is sad because the more references you have, the more fun and jokes you can get.

A Slovenian friend of mine thinks Tommy Cooper is great. Was he familiar with Ealing comedies? No, and their public screening without subtitles or dubbing is banned in Slovenia. In 2020 the Complainant offered him an egg on toast.

What's that? he asked, and asked me to show him how to make it. He's a masters graduate. But we, the foreigners, have the recipe.

Another friend asked me about the electric kettle.

What's that? The point of this is to illustrate that besides the language itself, there is the travelling sideways in time with which to deal.

A further non-analogy is that Mr Griffin did not have the benefit of a law requiring his boss to speak English in his own business. The extent of his opponents' English ability is unknown, but their preference for speaking Punjabi or Urdu locally was no impediment to business ownership.

The teaching of Slovene is paid lip service now and again. But nothing ever happens. There have been fake web pages, which lead nowhere. Probably harvesting foreigners' emails. Grand announcements. Nothing. There is a central organisation, which does not reply to emails. And there was a booby-prize invitation to a course which led only to an uncomfortable classroom scene...and then nowhere.

In the Complainant's experience Slovenia's provision of Slovene tuition for foreigners resembles its provision of health and welfare services for foreigners: fifteen years of none.

After fifteen years the best Ptuj ZRSZ could do was put the Complainant into a process which, after about three months of fanfare, enabled it to discover that he did not belong in a class of Albanian ladies who already understood the teacher in Slovene, and that this is not an A1 Slovene class for English speakers.

Which is why they immediately sent the three students away who were depending on that.

In this it resembles many arts events in Ptuj, which are considered a glittering success for the organisers whether anyone comes or not. Attendance isn't important because it isn't. Customers showing up can even be a bit of a nuisance.

The average enrolment was high. But zero for those three, of which the Complainant was 33.33%.

The ZJRS is a dog territory argument, not an argument to the ICCPR or international law.

The fact that Slovene has had a hard time over the years does not mean the tables are turned and you can now force-convert residents.

This sort of attitude - bereft of any actual facility or ability - is bad enough among the ordinary residents.

So to find it embedded in the law is a shock. Luckily there's a foreigner to tell the 99%+ of Slovenians who still aren't lawyers all about it.

The former unofficial status of Slovene does not call for revenge upon immigrants who were never in Yugoslavia, nor should the language form part of a mechanism of discrimination, official or otherwise.

By virtue of Slovenia's discrimination against non-Slovene speaking entrepreneurs the Complainant has been forced to seek work in the black market. He has been encouraged to think that anything goes in this regard, and if you speak Slovene, it usually does!

Besides being illegal if you don't speak Slovene, it is illegal for foreigners to start a business with a non-Slovenian name unaccompanied by a Slovenian name of equal or greater prominence, when it presents itself to the world.

But what about the people the law was made for? Enquiries revealed a massive crime wave.

In conclusion, Slovenians may be very grateful for their notional €30 and more per hour gain from keeping Slovene to themselves, and the €30 of it the Complainant didn't make is especially sweet to them. But the Complainant really cannot spend their hospitality or his minus €30 and more on food, energy or other consumables.

The Complainant invites anyone adjudicating to investigate from other sources the actual situation, glossed over by the Slovenians, with regard to the de facto survival options faced by its fully registered non-official-language inhabitants.

The Complainant invites his opponents. as evidence of their good faith in re ZJRS 13, to produce a single Anglophone fluent in Slovene with no familial connections.

The Government should act quickly to resolve these problems and admit liability without contest.

This completely counterproductive and unfulfilled legislation follows a pattern of disastrous human rights behaviour by Slovenia in its treatment of the Erased, Ljubljanska Banka depositors, refugees, people having their homes compulsorily sold in public auctions over miniscule debts, treatment of journalists, pollution, and successive administrations lawyering up instead of waking up, seizing up instead of coughing up.

Slovenia is now in its thirties. If the national bodies drag their feet over removing these unhealthy anti-minority laws and discriminatory administrative restraints, Slovenia should be fined for failing to meet its Treaty obligations.

But the Complainant does not think like the locals, with their famous axiom "Naj kravji sosed umre" i.e. "Let my neighbour's cow die." Decay is seen as the only source of progress.

Clearly, Slovenia's loss is not my gain. However populist or legal it may turn out to be in the local Courts, starving your occupier to death is not very hospitable, and not the type of integration into Slovenia the Complainant seeks.

Whether the internal judiciary can be neutral on the hegemony of the national raison d'être is questionable, and the requirement for essential dietary fatty acids cannot wait for the political representation foreigners in Slovenia do not have.