Campaigners demand answers over council’s defence of dual language decision with ‘no prospect of success’

Irish language campaigners have demanded answers from a local council after it spent two years fighting a legal battle over dual language street signage which “had virtually no prospect of success”.

Conradh na Gaeilge has questioned the conduct of the Armagh, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council and councillors in blocking the Irish language signage being displayed at Woodside Hill, near the Garvaghy Road in Portadown.

The campaigners say residents of the street clearly expressed support for the provision of the street signs and met the two-thirds threshold implemented by the council.

Judicial Review proceedings brought by Portadown grandmother Iris Hagan at the High Court in Belfast officially ended on Thursday after unionist councillors abstained on a fresh vote for the application, allowing it to proceed.

“There are now serious questions for both ABC Council and Unionist councillors who led the charge in opposing and denying a valid and sound application for a dual-language street sign at Woodside Hill,” said Cruise Nic Liam, Language Rights Coordinator from Conradh na Gaeilge.

• “Unionist Councillors consistently voted down the application that had a huge majority of residents in favour, and virtually negligible opposition.”

The council only adopted a dual language street sign policy in 2020, which meant signage would be installed if two-thirds of a street’s residents expressed support for it. Many other council areas have significantly lower thresholds, including Belfast where it sits at 15%.

“Even after residents of Woodside Hill overcame those thresholds and demonstrated overwhelming support for signage on their street, unionist Councillors continued to defy their own policy and deny that application,” Ms Nic Liam added.

The group added that the council had chosen to spend “huge sums of public money in the process to defend the indefensible, in a case that, in our opinion, had virtually no prospect of success for the council.”

It also said there had been a lack of transparency in council meetings on the subject, with several discussions taking place in confidential business.

Armagh Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council and the DUP, as the largest unionist party on the council, were both contacted for comment.