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PRESS RELEASE
Hidden cost of translation and interpretation to the UK Government,
argues Applied Language, a leading UK based translation agency.
AVAILABLE FOR IMMEDIATE USE
Date of issue: 14/12/06
Applied Language Solutions, a UK based translation agency who work closely with Government, arguethat the estimated figure of £100 million for translation and interpretation services to the UK Governmentis greatly underestimated, and that the actual cost is likely to be as high as £500 Million.Gavin Wheeldon, Managing Director of Applied Language, said: “Cultural and language diversity is partof society and translation will not go away; only grow due to increasing immigration numbers and EUexpansion. Europe’s translation industry is worth £3.5 billion, with UK the biggest player. The toptranslation companies in the UK alone collectively provide £146.87 million worth of translation per year.Although it is difficult to put an accurate figure on UK Government’s spend, it is certainly possible torecognise that the report’s figures are conservative.”“The report only specifically outlines translation use by just five key government departments. Thisdoesn’t take into consideration a huge number of government funded bodies outside of thesedepartments who regularly purchase translation and interpretation. Further to this, translation andinterpretation is quite often a hidden cost deep within other budgets, such as legal and marketing or disguised as project costs, rather than funds specifically allocated for translation.”Applied Language provide translation and interpretation services to many different local governments,public and emergency services, educational establishments and many other public bodies and quangos,and agree with Ruth Kelly that a review of money spent on language services is required, especially as itis set to further increase by 5%.Gavin said: “The Home Office alone spends an estimated £50 million a year on translation andinterpretation. One local council based in the South informs us that they spend £500,000 a year ontranslation and interpreting services. When you consider that there are 650 local councils in Britain whorequire translation and interpretation to varying degrees, it is possible to see that spend by local councilsalone easily amounts to £150 - £300 million per year.”“This extends further down the line to a whole host of Government funded bodies and quangos, such asCitizens Advice Bureau, Refugee Councils and Housing Associations, of which there are 3,000 who eachregularly purchase translation and interpretation to communicate with non-English speaking tenants.”“Printing costs of translated documents is also excessive. Public sector bodies often print in largevolumes, which are then often left on the shelf. A scheme should be put in place to print on demand.”It is therefore possible to see how difficult it is to estimate the actual cost of translation. However, if weconsider the scope of government departments and funded bodies who purchase translation andinterpretation, it is justifiable to state that at least £500 million is spent on these services, which wouldaccount for just 0.1% estimated spend of the £522.8 billion by the HM treasury in 2005/2006.Applied Language highlights that most of the information authorities have translated is the same; yetthey continue to purchase translation separately. The amount spent could easily be reduced if theGovernment looked to using advanced translation memory technology, such as Applied Language’ssystem ‘Govmem’, which is used by their clients within the UK Government. This system remembers,stores and re-uses translation. The stored translation could then be accessed by all public sector bodieswithout paying full cost again, which could reduce costs by up to 70%.
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