"Before, we had a huge network of local authority advisers and of course Cilt, which was the leading body for languages nationally.
dius.gov.uk/international/china/fellowships.html - Lingua@net Europa Plus, a multilingual online languages resource centre coordinated by Cilt, the national centre for languages, gives free access to resources for learning in 20 European languages for all ages.
But the quality and quantity of provision varies across the country says Kathryn Board, head of languages strategy at the CfBT, an education charity which has merged with Cilt, formerly the National Centre for Languages.
Something similar has happened with A-levels, taken at 18, where a quarter of all exams are now thought to be worth an A, against 12% 15 years ago.GCSE entries for foreign languages have fallen by 37% in five years, according to CILT, the national centre for languages.
Therese Comfort, head of primary languages at CILT, the National Centre for Languages, said: "These new figures are evidence of the great progress that we have seen in language teaching in primary schools over the last few years.
The worst had happened and as Boris Becker famously said when he lost a Wimbledon final, "nobody died out there!" But as I turfed out 20 years' work from my filing cabinets and re-read old strategy documents and speeches of support for modern foreign languages (MFL) and CILT Cymru by Welsh ministers of education, I was overcome by feelings of anger.
When officials informed me in January 2014 that funding for CILT Cymru was being slashed by 70%, it must have felt like another nail in the coffin for struggling MFL teachers.
As the former director of CILT Cymru, the national centre for languages in Wales, my sporting cliché of choice would be that of the tightrope walker.
Anne Marie Graham is head of skills, business and adult learning for CILT — The National Centre for Languages — a government centre aiming to promote languages in all sectors.
The survey, compiled jointly by CiLT, the Association for Language Learning and the University Council of Modern Languages, also reveals the policy is having a disproportionate effect on poorer and lower ability pupils.
