Flippin’ ’eck! Migrants are offered classes in Yorkshire

EE bah gum – asylum seekers in Bradford are being schooled in how to ‘speak Yorkshire’ to help them fit in.

Local phrases including ‘ey up’, ‘ta love’, ‘tarra’ and ‘I’m off t’shops’ are being taught to immigrants at evening classes held at a sixth form college.

The students hail from countries as diverse as Syria, Pakistan, all over Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

Chris Baillie, manager at Forster College, told The Telegraph that she began running the 12-week courses in June last year after English students struggled to understand the local dialect.

She said: ‘Students would go out in the city and would come back and ask “What does ‘ta love’ mean?”

‘They were coming here with such limited English but in Bradford, it’s a different animal.’

Ms Baillie said many of her students were asylum seekers who attend weekly dialect classes with up to 15 people in one of the most ethnically diverse cities in Britain.

One pupil, Ahmad Maaitah, a lawyer from Jordan, said that the classes have proved so helpful that he even managed to teach some Londoners ‘a bit of Yorkshire’ recently on a trip down south.

Mr Maaitah, 52, who has been in the UK for a year, said: ‘The classes are fun. I’ve learned phrases like “ta”, and “ey up”, “out” and “nought”.

‘I like them. I’m learning how to have Yorkshire accent.’