"RELATING TO CERTAIN ASPECTS OF THE LAWS ON THE USE OF LANGUAGES IN EDUCATION IN BELGIUM" v. BELGIUM (MERITS) JUDGMENT 11 sometimes in French, sometimes half in French and half in Dutch (paragraphs 138 and 345 of the Report). 11. A fundamental change was made to this system by the Act of 14th July 1932 "on language regulations in primary and intermediate education". The Bill submitted by the then Government introduced the concept of territoriality, but left families of the minority in each region with a certain freedom of choice. The explanatory memorandum stressed that the maternal language should merit the same respect as religious or philosophical convictions. During the parliamentary debate, many members of the House of Representatives and Senators, and in particular Walloon representatives, showed a marked preference for a more "territorial" solution. The Bill was amended to that effect and approved by the House of Representatives by 81 votes to 12 with 63 abstentions, and by the Senate by 82 votes to 25 with 13 abstentions. The territorial principle was likewise established in the Act of 28th June 1932 "on the use of languages in administrative matters" and in the Act of 15th June 1932 "on the use of languages in judicial matters". 12. The Act of 14th July 1932 was applicable to "nursery schools and municipal adopted or adoptable primary schools", to "establishments governed by the organic law on secondary education" (upper and lower secondary schools) and to "primary classes (preparatory sections) attached to secondary schools" (Sections 1, 8, 14 and 18). This law established a distinction between the regions considered to be unilingual and the areas recognised as bilingual. In the former, "the Flemish area", "the Walloon area" and "the Germanspeaking communes", the language of education was in principle that of the region (Sections 1, 8 and 14), while study of a second language (whether national or not) was compulsory only in secondary classes (Sections 3, 10, 11 and 16). This rule was, however, mitigated to a certain extent. Sections 2, 4, 15 and 17 provided that children whose maternal or usual language was not that of the region were entitled to receive their primary education in their own language. But the competent authorities remained the judges of the "reality of this need" and the "expediency of meeting it" by setting up "transmutation" classes; pupils enrolled in these classes were obliged to learn the language of the region from the second grade of primary schooling (third year) so that they would be able to derive profit, either from the fourth primary grade, or from technical or secondary education given in that language. Section 9 also provided that the "existing special language classes" in upper and lower secondary schools should be maintained for as long as they were attended by a sufficient number of pupils of three strictly defined categories. In the Brussels urban area and bilingual communes on the linguistic boundary, the language of instruction was to be the child’s maternal or usual