Ahead of a meeting of Carmarthenshire County Council's Executive Board on Monday 28th September, members of Cymdeithas yr Iaith in Carmarthenshire presented Mark James with an invitation to come to a public meeting to explain why the County Council carries out the majority of its work in English.

Sioned Elin Chair of Cymdeithas in Carmarthenshire explained:"Carmarthenshire County Council has adopted a language strategy which encourages schools and everyone else in the county to work in Welsh, and yet the Council carries out almost all of its own work entirely in English. Having looked at the agenda and reports for this meeting we saw that there are brief summaries in Welsh but that reports to the Executive Board are in English, and the reports and policy documents themselves are only in English. Those documents include Annual Improvement Report which looks across the work of the council, a vision for sustainable services for older people, budget and leisure services reports. Even the minutes of the Executive Board's previous meeting is in English.
"The County Council does not set an example for other organisations in the county in terms of using Welsh itself. This will therefore be the discussion in the next in a series of public meetings, Tynged yr Iaith yn Sir Gâr - “The Fate of the Language in Carmarthenshire". The meeting on the 30th January will ask the question: Does Carmarthenshire County Council itself work in Welsh?"

John Gwilym Jones, former Arch-druid of the National Eisteddfod, joined Cymdeithas yr Iaith to present the invitation. 
Sioned Elin added:
"We are grateful that a number of council officers and leading councillors have agreed to attend the meeting to discuss the matter, but we believe that the Council's Chief Executive needs to be accountable and explain publicly the plan to change the council's working language – and answer questions from the public. We are grateful that John Gwilym Jones, who is used to Eisteddfod announcing ceremonies, came to announce the public meeting and to give Mark James the invitation to be present.