Madam,

Liz Saville Roberts, Plaid Cymru MP for Dwyfor Meirionydd and leader of the Plaid Cymru Westminster group, gave a speech in parliament advocating legal changes to equality legislation.

She argued that hate directed at the Welsh language should be illegal.

It all started with an article in the Sunday Times by journalist Rod Liddle. He wrote about the Welsh and the Welsh language in a most derogatory manner.

Then, there appeared a second abusive article in the Spectator by the same journalist. This second article has outraged me.

In this article, he insults me (and others like me) by writing that I am one of the Sunday Times readers who “went bananas” over what he describes as “a joke about Welsh vowels”. He calls me a “tuppenny panjandrum”. According to Mr Liddle, I am “dimbo, chippy and gossamer-skinned”.

The word “dimbo” is an invented word. I imagine that it means “dumb”. I can only guess that the word “tuppenny” means that I am of low value.

“Panjandrums”, according to Google, means a person who claims to have a great deal of authority and influence. Such people, Mr Liddle goes on to explain, are “largely from within Plaid Cymru”.

Undoubtedly, Mr Liddle increased the sale of the Times newspaper by being controversial. That is fine by me. What is not fine is his public assault on Plaid Cymru’s Arfon Jones, the north Wales police and crime commissioner. He calls him a “dunderhead” (informal early 17th century word for stupid), “imbecile” and “halfwit”.

Can you imagine any English-speaking police and crime commissioner in England being described thus? It’s unimaginable.

Let’s consider his assault on me as a Welsh-speaking Welshwoman. He says I am “chippy”. I have been unable to find this word in the Oxford English dictionary. Elsewhere, I have found: “... touchy and defensive, especially on account of having a grievance”.

If this is an accurate translation of the word, then I am most certainly “chippy”, and I am “gossamer-skinned”.

As a Welsh-speaking Welsh woman, I have had the best life possible for any Welshman or Welsh woman since 1282 when our last Prince, Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, died in battle at Cilmeri and the Welsh became a conquered people.

I received my primary education exclusively in the Welsh language, and lived in peace in a Welsh community throughout my early years. As a current town councillor, I am left in peace to be a member of a Welsh-speaking council. I am a school governor in a Welsh-medium primary school. I am trustee of a Welsh-medium community centre. My local branch of Plaid Cymru is again Welsh-medium. There is no persecution whatsoever.

My grandparents and my great-grandparents were beaten in school for speaking Welsh. So, yes, I have a grievance. I am hugely touchy about my language and my nationality. Do you blame me?

Why am I racially abused by the likes of Mr Liddle because I am a Welsh-speaking Welsh woman? Incomprehensible.

Yours etc,

Carol A Hayes, Y Ddôl, Porthmadog.

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