Census 2016 - Irish dying a slow death?

THERE were no startling revelations in the census details published by the CSO yesterday.

The population is increasing steadily, if slowly. It rose by 3.8% between April 2011 and April 2016 to reach 4,761,865. The make up of that population is changing though. Migration over the five years showed that 22,500 more people left the country than entered. Today, there are 810,000 people living in Ireland who were not born here. This represents 17.3% of the population. Polish people make up the largest single foreign nationality in the country, followed by the Britons and Lithuanians.

When asked about their religious beliefs, 3.7m people said they were Catholic, a fall from 84% of the population to 78%. Those figures underline an enduring commitment to Catholicism even though the second largest group in this category was made up of those — 10% — who said they were not allied to any religion.

The census recorded a similar decline in the use of Irish. Of the 1.76m people who claimed they could speak Irish, only 73,803 spoke the language every day outside of the education system. This is 3,382 fewer than in 2011. In Gaeltacht areas, only 32% spoke Irish every day outside the education system. These figures tell a story of decline and rejection. They also bring a day of reckoning closer — how long more can we pretend the massive investment in Irish is paying dividends?