THIS country is good at many things, but languages are not among them.

It is a source of great embarrassment that many Europeans can speak several languages, whereas we struggle to master basic French or German despite several years of study at school.

If the United Kingdom is to move forward in terms of global business and as a nation in general, we need to change the way in which we educate our children.

Pupils at Chorley New Road Primary School may be among the first to benefit from a positive change in attitude, with children being taught French from the age of five.

Indeed, their headteacher believes they will be capable of passing a GCSE in the language by the age of 13.

Education secretary Alan Johnson is looking at making language compulsory from the age of seven, with Mandarin and Urdu among the options.

We congratulate the Horwich school for its forward thinking and sincerely hope Government plans to invest more money in the teaching of languages become reality.

If it does, we may one day compete on a level playing field with other European countries.