Proposal to ban Irish street signs from 10 Belfast streets fails

A proposal to stop 10 streets across Belfast from ever having Irish dual language street signs has been rejected.

The option to effectively ban street signs with Irish was voted down at a Belfast City Council Committee this week.

The council had received applications for dual language signage in all 10 streets.

Council officers gave elected representatives two options, to agree that surveys of residents be carried out or agree that no surveys be carried out “on the grounds of the potential adverse impacts”.

If councillors had chosen the second option, applications on all 10 would have been closed.

Instead councillors chose for surveys to go ahead on nine.

The 10 streets are: Ormeau Road, Delhi Street, Whitewell Road, Victoria Road, Upper Dunmurry Lane, Burmah Street, Upper Newtownards Road, Sunningdale Gardens, Belmont Avenue and Donegall Road.

Members agreed that the application for Donegall Road was closed on the basis of a former committee agreement that signs would only be erected in the section within the Gaeltacht Quarter boundary between Falls Road and Broadway roundabout.

A proposal by the DUP to not survey any of the 10 streets, did not go to a vote.

SDLP councillor Gary McKeown said: “I think it is unacceptable we would even consider stopping people living on these streets having their say on proposed bilingual signage.

“There is no point in having a policy if we are going to override it at this committee, and dictate the outcome without even engaging with the community.

“It risks sending out a signal that the council thinks people in certain streets that people basically can’t be trusted to engage in the process in a mature and reflective way. There is also a risk it would set a dangerous precedent.”

Regarding Ormeau Road, DUP councillor Davy Douglas raised an objection.

He said Ormeau Road was a mixed community and progress has been made in recent years around issues with flags in the area.

“I feel that the adoption of Irish street signage could be seen as divisive and have an adverse effect on good relations within the community, undoing some of the progress that has been made,” he said.

The People and Communities committee also voted this week to erect Irish dual language signs on four streets – despite the numbers of residents opposing the Irish signs outnumbering those who support them.