Minister: Immigrants should speak English

The Junior Minister with responsibility for integration has said he wants to see a situation where a person's application for Irish citizenship is affected by their fluency in English.

Conor Lenihan was speaking following calls by the Immigrant Council for more English courses to help immigrants overcome language barriers.

He says he supports such calls, but also wants to introduce a new system whereby competence in English would affect a person's citizenship or residency application.