£50,000 to be spent on new Irish website

£50,000 to be spent on new Irish website

22 June 2016

NEWRY, Mourne and Down Council is to press ahead with plans for an Irish language website.

The move was agreed at last week’s meeting of the local authority’s Strategic Policy and Resources Committee, but was opposed by unionist politicians who questioned the £50,000 cost of  the project.

A new corporate website is currently being designed and politicians have agreed its main pages will be available in both English and Irish, in line with the local authority’s bilingualism policy.

The website’s English content will initially be translated into Irish using the Google translation facility, but because of concerns about its accuracy, the translated material will be manually checked by a fluent Irish speaker and corrected where necessary, before the information is posted on line.

While Sinn Fein, SDLP, Alliance and Independent members of the council committee backed plans for an Irish language website, Ulster Unionist and DUP councillors said while they had no issue with the Irish language, they felt the money required to launch and maintain the website could be better spent cleaning the district’s streets for example.

Last week’s debate on the Irish language website was held shortly after it emerged that several of the council’s new bilingual town signs in the Ballynahinch area had been defaced.

DUP councillor Billy Walker said he believed the £50,000 required for the new website would be “better spent elsewhere” and claimed unionists feel the Irish language “is being forced upon them.”

He continued: “We are putting up our bilingual signs across the district and some of them have not lasted 10 hours with several already defaced. This is wrong and no council property should be defaced in this manner, but warnings were issued last year that this would happen. It is sad that it has.

“There are people out there who think the Irish language is being forced upon them and I am opposed to this Irish website,” he added, seeking assurances that the number of hits will be monitored, with the information made available to elected representatives.

Councillor Robert Burgess (UUP) said he was also opposed to the Irish website, insisting he has nothing against the language. He said his concerns about the website centre around the costs involved.

SDLP councillor Gareth Sharvin said there is agreement in place that the local authority should promote the Irish language, while his party colleague Terry Andrews suggested while the information on the corporate website should be in English and Irish, the needs of people from Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia living and working in the district should also be considered.

Committee chairman, Patrick Brown (Alliance), said there is an issue as to how accurate the Google translation service is. Sinn Fein’s Willie Clarke agreed and said Irish language teachers tell students and their parents not to use the Google service as the translation is poor.

Independent councillor Cadogan Enright described the Google translation of English into Irish as “gobbledegook and of no use to anyone who speaks Irish.”

He added: “Since we are starting our new council with a new corporate website I really can’t see any excuse not to start on the right foot, rather than pushing us back into the dark ages again. The website should be in English and Irish. We don’t currently have a facility for people to talk to us in Irish and the least we need is a website where they can glean information.”

The decision taken by councillors at last week’s meeting has to be ratified by the full council at its monthly meeting on July 4.