“Top-down” or “Bottom-up”? Language Policies in Public Service Interpreting in the Republic of Ireland, Scotland and Spain O'Rourke, Bernadette Castillo Ortiz, Pedro Jesús Traducción e Interpretación Interpretación en los servicios públicos (ISP) Interpretación bilateral Translation and Interpreting Public Service Interpreting Community Interpreting Economic prosperity along with ensuing labour shortages and a marked increase in the number of asylum seekers and political refugees have had a significant impact on the ethnic and linguistic make-up of many of our societies. The past number of years has witnessed a renewed interest in issues of language policy and planning, emerging from these changes, where nation-states are becoming more varied, diverse and at the same time more global. Language policy and planning initiatives in the area of public sector interpreting in Ireland, Scotland and Spain are examined in this paper. All three contexts offer examples of cases where there has been a marked increase in the number of economic immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers in recent years. Language policy and planning measures which regulate for the provision of interpreting services to non-indigenous ethnic minority language groups in all three contexts are critically explored. This paper explores both overt and covert “top-down” policies at government and institutional level, as well as “bottom-up” and grassroots initiatives taking place to resist, protest about or negotiate declared language policies and to propose alternatives. 2026-02-20T09:38:49Z 2026-02-20T09:38:49Z 2009 book part O'Rourke, B. & Castillo Ortiz, P. J. (2009). “Top-down” or “Bottom-up”? Language Policies in Public Service Interpreting in the Republic of Ireland, Scotland and Spain. In: De Pedro Ricoy, R.; Perez, I & Wilson, C. (eds.). Interpreting and Translating in Public Service Settings. Policy, Practice, Pedagogy. St. Jerome Publishing. Págs. 33-51. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315760230 9781905763160 https://hdl.handle.net/10481/111297 10.4324/9781315760230 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ open access Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internacional St. Jerome Publishing