Increase in the number of people in Tipperary who can speak Irish

There were 66,003 Irish speakers in Tipperary in 2022.

That is according to the recently released Census 2022 Profile Eight dataset by the Central Statistics Office.

The total Irish speakers increased by 612 compared to 2016. The Irish Language and Education set showed that 43% of people over three years of age in Tipperary can speak Irish to some degree.

Women were more likely to be able to speak Irish than men. Of speakers, 47% were female and 35% male.

The towns with the highest number of Irish speakers were Clonmel (6,398), Nenagh (3,557), Thurles (3,221) and Carrick-On- Suir (1,846).

The Catch

While the figures were great news for advocates of the language, there was a catch. Most people who could speak the language, only did so as part of their studies.

Census 2022 found that 20,639 people in Tipperary spoke Irish daily within the education system.

However, only 902 people spoke Irish daily outside of education.That was a decrease on the 2016 figure of 1,051. And there was more bad news.

Outside of education, 3,330 people said they spoke Irish on a weekly basis, down from 3,472 in 2016.

Census 2022 was the first time the CSO has asked how well a person can speak Irish.

They found that 5,023 people or 8% of Irish speakers in Tipperary can speak Irish very well.

A further 21, 45 or 33% said they could speak it well. But, 53% or 36,981 people reported not being able to speak the language well.