A Belfast Council committee has voted to erect Irish dual language signs on four streets in the city - despite the numbers of residents opposing the Irish signs outnumbering those who support them in each street.
Wynchurch Avenue in East Belfast, Sunningdale Park North and Ben Madigan Park South in North Belfast, and Wellington Park Terrace in South Belfast were all previously deferred as applications for Irish dual language, after they all met the threshold for signage erection, but at the same time had greater numbers opposing the new signage than were in favour.
A fifth street, Malone Valley Park, was also deferred but was closed as an application earlier this week at a full council meeting on Monday.
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At the March meeting of the council’s People and Communities Committee on Tuesday, elected members were asked to agree a proposed mechanism for dealing with deferred applications, after several years of wrangling about what to do in cases where applications met the threshold of 15 percent, but were outnumbered by residents in opposition.
Since 2022, when the new dual language street signage policy was introduced, all applications deferred on the basis of opposition outnumbering support were “put at the back of the queue” - to be reconsidered after those in the considerable waiting list were dealt with.
At the People and Communities Committee, Sinn Féin Councillor Róis-Máire Donnelly proposed moving forward with erecting dual language street signs in Irish for four of those deferred - Wynchurch Avenue, Sunningdale Park North, Ben Madigan Park South and Wellington Park Terrace.
She said it was “in line with the minority rights guidance we have signed up to in this policy”.
On a poll in the chamber, 11 voted in favour of Councillor Donnelly's proposal, from Sinn Féin and the SDLP, while nine voted against, from the DUP and Alliance. The matter will go to the full Belfast Council meeting at the start of April, where it could face another knife-edge vote.
In terms of figures, Wynchurch Avenue in its first survey had 18 percent in favour of Irish street signs and 26 percent opposing (20 residents to 30 residents) while in its second survey had 15.04 percent in favour and 28.31 percent against (17 residents to 32 residents).
Sunningdale Park North had 22 percent in favour and 33 percent in opposition (22 residents to 33 residents), Ben Madigan Park South had 23.18 percent in favour and 26.08 percent against (16 residents to 18 residents), while Wellington Park Terrace had 17.14 percent in favour and 31.42 percent against (6 residents to 11 residents).
DUP Councillor Fred Cobain said at the committee meeting: “In terms of Sunningdale Park North it is quite clear the vast majority of people who live in that street don’t want a dual language sign. It doesn’t matter how many times you survey - it is a clear indication of the views of the people in that street.”
DUP Councillor Sarah Bunting said: “This is costing money, it is causing division amongst settled communities. I have had a woman on the phone with me for an hour and a half telling me she does not want signs - and she is not a DUP voter.
"She is really opposed to these signs because it is such a settled community, and she really feels there is an impact in forcing these signs through whenever the majority on the street do not want them.”
In 2022 councillors agreed a new policy on dual language street signs. Sinn Féin, Alliance, the SDLP, the Green Party, and the People Before Profit Party all support the new street sign policy, while the three unionist parties, the DUP, UUP and PUP, are against it.
The new policy means at least one resident of any Belfast street, or a councillor, is all that is required to trigger a consultation on a second nameplate, with 15 percent in favour being sufficient to erect the sign. Non-responses will no longer be counted as “against” votes, and there will be an equality assessment for each application.
Before that the policy required 33.3 percent of the eligible electorate in any Belfast street to sign a petition to begin the process, and 66.6 percent to agree to the new dual language sign on the street.
At the People and Communities Committee on Tuesday, councillors also voted in favour of new recommendations by council officers to deal with “back of the queue” applications where opposition was greater despite the threshold having been met.
Currently, the applicant for the street that was deferred is written to and advised of the committee decision. Their application is marked as deferred and another application in their name will be created at the end of the queue, when all other applications up to that point were dealt with. Once the deferred application is reached, it will be brought back to committee to consider how it is to be progressed.
The council report on the matter states: “In addition to the above, we will write to applicants of all applications for the same street and for any second language and advise them of the committee decision for that street based on a previous application.
“All the applications are marked 'on hold' noting that further processing of the applications is on hold pending the outcome of the deferred application. Any subsequent applicants for the street would be informed that a decision has already been made to defer an application for consideration in the initial language, but that applications would be taken and marked 'on hold' until the time a decision is made on the deferred application.”
Elected members previously decided to defer consideration of two applications for Ebor Street in East Belfast and Ballysillan Road in North Belfast prior to survey, based on "adverse impacts" identified at the initial assessment and based on elected member notifications.
At the People and Communities Committee on Tuesday, the DUP proposed closing these applications altogether. They failed, with five votes in favour of the proposal from the DUP, and 15 votes from all the other parties against the proposal. The Ebor Street and Balysillan Road applications will go to the back of the queue under the new recommendations.
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