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Newham Council Community Language Survey Speakers of Punjabi
1.
Characteristics of respondents
79
respondents answering the Language Survey were speakers of Punjabi.
Table 1 summarises their general characteristics.
·
Almost three-quarters of the respondents (73%) were female and the great
majority were aged over 45 (84%), with more than half of respondents
aged over 65 (51%).
·
Two out of every three respondents originated in India (67%), with the
remainder originating largely in other Asian countries (19% or 15 respondents
from Pakistan and 5% or 4 respondents from Afghanistan). A small minority
of 8% came from Africa – mostly from Kenya.
·
Virtually 9 out of 10 of the Punjabi speakers interviewed (87%) had lived
in this country for more than 10 years, and 62% for over 20 years.
Table 1: Characteristics of Punjabi language respondents
2.
Language and communication skills
Language most comfortable using
All
of the respondents were most comfortable using Punjabi when speaking,
although a minority mentioned Urdu (8%) and 1 respondent Hindi.
With
regard to both reading and writing, a significant minority said none
or gave no answer as to which language they were most comfortable using,
as Table 2 below shows. This amounted to a third of respondents for
reading and over 40% for writing.
For
reading or writing, the largest percentage were still most comfortable
using Punjabi, although a range of other languages were mentioned including
Urdu, Hindi, Bengali, Tamil and English.
Base
= all respondents
Having
stated which language they felt most comfortable using, respondents
were also asked about any other languages they felt comfortable using
for everyday conversations. 70% volunteered no other language, but 14%
mentioned Urdu, 10% Hindi, 7% English and one respondent each mentioned
Swahili, Pushti, Dari, Persian, Arabic and Gujurati.
Formal verbal communication in English/ own language
Respondents
were asked how confident they are about talking formally and understanding
what is being said when someone is talking formally to them – they were
given the examples of talking to their Doctor, the Police or the Council.
They were asked about their talking and understanding in both English
and their own language. Table 3 below compares the proportions able
to talk formally in English and understand when English is spoken formally
to them, with those able to talk or understand their own language in
a formal situation.
Respondents
were not at all confident about being able to communicate verbally in
English – in each case, over half of the respondents say they cannot
talk formally or understand formal talk in English very well, and almost
40% cannot talk or understand English at all in formal situations.
Among
respondents who have been in this country over 20 years, half feel they
cannot communicate well in English in formal situations, and over 40%
say they cannot communicate at all.
Respondents
show limited confidence about talking and understanding in a formal
situation when using their own language – around half say they could
communicate very well, and half that they could communicate quite
well.
Table 3 : Formal communication: talking and understanding
Formal written communication in English / own language
When
asked about written communication in English, respondents express very
little confidence, with 62% say they could not read a formal
letter in English at all, and a further 32% not very well. Three out
of four (73%) would not feel able to write a formal or official
letter in English at all, and the remaining 23% say not very well.
However,
respondents are much less confident with regard to reading and writing
formal letters in their own language than with verbal communication
– just under half (47%) say they could read and understand a
formal letter very well or quite well, and only 30% believe they could
write a formal letter very well or quite well. In fact, only
just under half of all respondents (46%) say that they would not be
able to write a formal letter in their own language at all.
Confidence
in their ability to read English does not improve over time – of those
who have lived here over 20 years, 69% say they could not read a formal
letter in English at all and 78% that they could not write such a letter
at all.
Table 4 : Formal communication: reading and writing
Reading an English newspaper/ publication
There
are no Punjabi speaking respondents who are very confident
that they are able to read and understand the information in a daily
newspaper such as the Sun, Mirror, Guardian or Times. 10% are quite
confident about undertaking this, but three-quarters of all the respondents
are not at all confident about their ability to read a newspaper
in English.
Table 5: Level of confidence in being able to read a daily newspaper
in English Base
= all respondents
3.
Contact with the Council
Use of council services
Only
37% of respondents claimed to have used council services in the past
(29 respondents), They gave a variety of reasons for contact, most often
for council tax payment or enquiries (45%) or with regard to benefits
in general (41%), or less often for housing/ accommodation matters,
housing benefits, or educational matters (14% or 4 respondents in each
case).
Table
6 below shows the level of understanding in both verbal and written
contact with the Council.
(Clearly
sample sizes are small so responses should be viewed with caution.)
Table 6: Ease of understanding Council staff/ letters from Council
Verbal contact with the council
90%
of respondents had had face-to-face contact with council staff, while
7% (2 respondents) had spoken to them on the telephone and a GP had
spoken to the council on behalf of 1 respondent.
The
majority of these respondents had experienced difficulty in understanding
the council staff that dealt with their enquiry, as shown in Table 6
above. Only just over a quarter said it was fairly easy to understand
council staff, and 73% had experienced some or great difficulty.
59%
of respondents contacting the council
were presented with an option to use an interpreter, and 8 out
of the 12 respondents not given this option felt that this would have
helped.
Of
those 17 respondents given the option of using an interpreter, all then
mostly or fully understood the council staff as a result. No respondents
felt that having an interpreter failed to improve their understanding.
When
visiting Council offices, just over half of respondents normally take
someone else with them, 48% say they go alone:
- 31% take a family member - 28% take a friend - 1 respondent takes a project worker
Written contact with the Council
As
with verbal contact, the majority of respondents only understand letters
received from the council with difficulty (Table 6). 59% experience
‘some difficulty’ and 14% ‘great difficulty’. Only a quarter of respondents
find it fairly or very easy to understand letters.
72%
of respondents said it would help if letters were translated, essentially
because it would allow them to read it for themselves and be independent.
4.
Communication options
Newspaper readership
70%
of all Punjabi speaking respondents do not regularly read any newspaper.
Table 7 below shows the most popular newspapers among the sample, dominated
by Des Pardes read by less than one in five of the sample (18%). Jung
and the Punjab Times are each mentioned by 4% of the sample (3 respondents),
but although some 10 other newspapers are mentioned, none are read by
more than one or two respondents.
Table 7: Readership of newspapers
Broadcast media
A
minority of respondents does not listen to any radio or TV channel in
their own language – 14% do not regularly listen to any radio programme
and 22% do not regularly watch any TV channel in their own language.
Most
popular among radio programmes is Sunrise Radio, which 71% of all respondents
claim to listen to regularly. 10% mention Punjab Radio, and 4% Sukh
Sager (3 respondents).
By
far the most mentioned TV channel is Zee TV, watched regularly by 62%
of all respondents. A further third of respondents (35%) watch Lishkara.
The other specific television channels mentioned by more than one respondent
are B4U (6%), PTV , Sony, Asia Net and Sky Channels (the last four all
mentioned by 3% or 2 respondents in each case).
Computer ownership
Just
over a quarter of all respondents (27%) live in households where someone
has a computer – only 1 respondent owns a computer themselves, but the
remainder have a family member who owns one. However, only 3 respondents
said they would be able to use the computer to access information.
Table
8 compares the proportions of the sample as a whole who can be reached
by the different media types.
Table 8: Exposure to different media types Base
= all respondents
5.
Other sources of information
Voluntary organisations visited
81%
of all respondents regularly use or visit at least one voluntary organisation.
Of these 64 respondents:
·
56% mention the Ekta Project – representing 46% of the sample as a whole
(36 respondents), by far the largest proportion;
·
16% Behno ki Milan - representing 13% of the whole sample (10 respondents);
·
9% Frond Community Centre (6 respondents);
·
8% the Newham Elderly Punjabi Involvement Movement (5 respondents);
·
4% Subco Elders Group (4 respondents);
·
4% Fair and Share (4 respondents).
No
other centre or organisation is mentioned by more than one respondent.
Although
sample sizes are too small for any detailed analysis, all of these apart
from Behno ki Milan are visited more by older respondents and those
who have lived here the longest (e.g. three quarters of those using
the Ekta project are aged over 65).
Religious venues visited
Only
a slightly lower proportion of respondents regularly attends a religious
venue – 76%. 90% of these visit the Gurdwara, only 1 or 2 respondents
specify a Hindu Temple or Mosque.
Sources of help and advice
Asked
where they would go for help, advice or support, the highest proportion
of respondents, 27%, would go to the Ekta Project, a further 13% to
the Trinity Centre, 11% to their local
‘service centre’, 6%
to the Hartley Centre and 5% to their Community Centre.
A
quarter (23%) said they would ask their friends, family and neighbours.
2
or 3 respondents each mentioned their Doctor, the Council offices or
Town Hall, and the Citizen’s Advice Bureau or other Advice Centres.
Usual sources of information
When
asked about ‘the most common way’ that they hear information (e.g. events,
benefits etc), over 70% of respondents rely on word of mouth. 23% refer
to leaflets in English, but only 3% mention leaflets in their own language.
Table 9: Most common way of hearing information Base
= all respondents
Respondents
were also asked if they could think of anywhere else information could
be publicised to make it easier for them to access. Three-quarters had
no suggestions to make. Table 10 summarises the main suggestions put
forward, with Community Centres suggested by 10% of respondents, and
medical centres and cultural organisations mentioned by 6% each (5 respondents).
A
number of other possibilities are put forward by 1 or 2 respondents
each, such as religious venues, leisure centres, educational centres,
libraries and housing offices.
Table 10: Suggested places for publicising information Base
= all respondents
When
asked which format would be most useful for information to be
supplied in, respondents showed an overwhelming preference for text
translations (66%) rather than audio, video or telephone translations.
Text is preferred across all age groups.
The
main reasons given for this preference are that with text they:
·
can read it myself (46%)
·
easier to understand (29%)
Only
a limited number (14%) believe that the text translation is the least
useful format for information in their own language.
Telephone
and video translations are generally regarded as the least useful
format for information. 28% of respondents name telephone translations
as the least useful as they can’t spare the time and/ or don’t use telephones.
A further 25% feel video tape translations would be least useful, seeing
them as ‘more difficult’ and ‘not necessarily appropriate’.
Base
= all respondents
6.
Provision of information by the Council in leaflet form
Ease of reading leaflets
Table
12 shows how easy or difficult respondents find it to get information
from leaflets in English and in their own language. Virtually all of
the respondents (95%) have difficulty in reading leaflets themselves
in English, with 58% saying they would have great difficulty.
In
addition, two out of three (66%) say they would have difficulty in getting
someone to explain the contents of a leaflet to them.
Just
over half of those who could get someone to explain (51%) would look
to a family member to help explain, 46% to a friend or neighbour and
12% mention Etka or other community project as providing this role.
Half
of the sample (49%) said they would find it fairly or very easy to read
a leaflet in their own language. Conversely, 18% would encounter some
difficulty and 27% have great difficulty in reading a leaflet in their
own language.
Only
just over half (54%) said they could fairly or very easily get someone
to explain a leaflet in their own language to them, again generally
relying on family members (51%) or friends and neighbours (47%), with
only a small minority (9%) relying on community workers or advisors.
Table 12: Ease of reading leaflets or getting leaflets explained in English
and in own language Base
= all respondents
Preferred options for receiving information from the council
When
asked initially, respondents generally welcomed the idea of being given
details with a leaflet in English of where they could go to have an
interpreter explain the leaflet to them – 89% felt this would be useful.
The minority who rejected this suggestion (15%) did so largely either
because they are satisfied that they have someone to hand who can translate
for them (9%) or because it is too difficult or time-consuming to go
out to an interpreter (6%).
However,
given a number of options, having a place to go for a translation is
less popular than receiving a fully translated leaflet – well over half
of respondents would prefer to have a fully translated leaflet (58%).
This preference is expressed most often by those aged under 55 in the
sample.
The
other three options suggested are almost equally regarded as least
useful across the sample as a whole, as Table 13 below shows. Conversely,
only 6% of the sample regard a text translation as the least useful
of the four suggestions
Table 13: Most and least useful method for receiving general information Base
= all respondents
Full
translated leaflet Partial
translation with a system to get further information Leaflet
in English with telephone number to request a translation Somewhere
you can go) Summary Sheet - Punjabi
·
Sample consists mainly
of middle-age / older individuals, three-quarters of whom are female.
·
Mostly from India, though
some from Pakistan.
·
Long UK residency – the
majority over 20 years.
·
Quite low newspaper readership
Des Pardes is the most common newspaper. Sunrise Radio is by far the
most popular radio station.
·
Around a quarter live in
households where there is a computer.
·
High use of voluntary organisations
(esp. Ekta Project)
·
Attendance at religious
venues is prevalent (esp. Gurwdwara)
·
Information/advice/help
gained via word of mouth from local community/family.
·
English - Verbal - very poor, many unable to understand
at all Written - very poor, most unable
to understand at all
·
Punjabi - Verbal – quite good, but most are quite rather
than very confident Written - quite poor, most feel
unable to write themselves
·
Only a minority have utilised
council services (for Council Tax/Benefits).
·
Contact evaluated as very
difficult, both written and verbal
·
Most verbal contact is
face to face; many take a friend/family member for help.
·
Prefer full Punjabi text
translations of leaflets.
·
Suggest providing this
information in Cultural Centres, Religious Venues, leisure centres. |
