10,000 Wolverhampton schoolchildren hit language barrier

New figures reveal there are 139 different languages in the city's schools.

A total of 9,904 pupils do not count English as their mother tongue, with Dagaare, Kurdish, Chinese, Igbo, Czech, Italian, Indonesian, Arabic, Bengali, Armenian and Greek all spoken.

Councillor Claire Darke, Wolverhampton's education boss, said it was a positive thing for the city. Although, she did admit it proved a challenge for teachers, other classroom staff and the council's budget.

She said: "There is no doubt catering for all these different languages in schools presents a challenge for our education department given the financial pressures we face.

"What must be remembered though is that the variety of languages spoken in our schools echoes the diversity that goes to make up the rich tapestry of Wolverhampton as a city."

West Midlands UKIP MEP Bill Etheridge said it was a consequence of mass immigration - and 'a perfect example of the chaos of the current system'.

"These numbers show the effect of the mass immigration the UK has had to deal with," he said. "It's not Wolverhampton council's fault that we have this mass immigration. When these children arrive in Wolverhampton, the council has a right and an obligation to educate them.

"This is a problem with the government not being able to control our borders. I would like to see us leave the EU, take control of the borders, and put a system in place where we can properly monitor who is coming and going so we can help places like schools prepare and know exactly what they will be dealing with. It's a perfect example of the chaos of the current system."

The figures came from an FOI request.

Wolverhampton council declined to say how many interpreters were used in city schools and at what cost.

Recent statistics released by the Department for Education show that 89 per cent of schoolchildren in the UK are achieving the required level of English they need as they leave primary school.

In the West Midlands, this figure is 88 per cent but for Wolverhampton it is down to 87 per cent, and just 84 per cent for boys.

Afrikaans, Czech, Ilokano, Nepali, Slovenian, Akan (Fante), Dagaare, Indonesian/Bahasa, Indonesian, Norwegian, Somali, Akan (Twi/Asante), Danish, Italian, Oriya, Sotho/Sesotho, Akan/Twi-Fante, Dari, Persian, Italian (Any Other), Pahari (Pakistan), Spanish Albanian/Shqip, Dutch/Flemish, Kannada, Pangasinan, Swahili (Any Other), Amharic, Ebira Kashmiri, Panjabi, Swahili/Kiswahili, Anyi-Baule, Edo/Bini, Kinyarwanda, Panjabi (Any Other), Swedish, Arabic, Efik-Ibibio, Korean, Panjabi (Gurmukhi), Tagalog, Arabic (Any Other), Esan/Ishan, Krio, Panjabi (Mirpuri), Tagalog/Filipino, Arabic (Iraq), Estonian, Kurdish, Panjabi (Pothwari), Tamil, Arabic (Morocco), Farsi/Persian Kurdish (Any Other), Pashto/Pakhto, Telugu, Arabic (Sudan), Fijian, Kurdish (Kurmanji), Persian/Farsi, Temne, Armenian, Filipino, Kurdish (Sorani), Polish, Thai, Balochi, Finnish, Latvian, Portuguese, Tigre, Bengali, Fon, Lingala, Portuguese (Any Other), Tigrinya, Bengali (Any Other), French, Lithuanian, Portuguese (Brazil), Tswana/Setswan, a Bengali (Sylheti), Fula/Fulfulde, Luganda, Rajasthani/Marwa, ri Turkish, Berber/Tamazight, Gaelic/Irish, Macedonian, Romani (International), Ukrainian, Bosnian, Georgian, Maithili, Romanian, Urdu, British Sign Language, German, Malayalam, Romanian ( Romania), Vietnamese, Bulgarian, Greek, Manding/Malinke, Romansch visayan (other), Caribbean Creole, English Guarani, Manding/Malinke (Any Other), Romany/English Romanes, Visayan/Bisaya, Chechen, Gujarati, Marathi, Russian, Welsh/Cymraeg, Chichewa/Nyanja, Hausa, Maya (Any), Serbian, Wolof, Chinese, Hindi, Moldavian, Serbian/Croatian/ Bosnian, Yao/Chiyao (East Africa), Chinese (Cantonese), Hungarian, Ndebele, Shona, Yoruba, Chinese (Mandarin/Putonghua), Icelandic, Ndebele (South Africa), Sinhala, Zulu, Croatian, Igbo, Ndebele (Zimbabwe), Slovak