Call for ‘family-friendly’ meeting hours at County Hall

Starting and finishing times of Galway County Council plenary meetings should be family friendly, a newly-elected member has said.

Councillor Aisling Dolan (Ind) asked that the policy towards meetings should be family friendly and should not dissuade women from getting into local politics.

Cllr Dolan, one of only a handful of women elected to the Council in May’s Local Elections, said she was the first woman in 40 years to represent East Galway on the local authority.

Cllr James Charity (Ind) said a number of elected members on the previous Council did not put their names forward for re-election, and part of that was due to the demands of their day jobs, and having to take annual leave to attend County Council meetings.

He agreed with a suggestion from Cllr Donagh Killilea (FF), that start times should be brought forward to 1pm, as opposed to 11am, but he stressed the change would only work if the Municipal Districts were used properly.

Cllr Charity said there was no point discussing matters at full Council meetings that should be dealt with in each local area Municipal District meetings.

Cathaoirleach Malachy Noone (FG) concurred and warned elected members that he will rule their contributions out of order if they raise matters that should have been dealt with at Municipal District level.

A suggestion from Cllr Joe Byrne (FG) that not every member had to make a contribution to every topic, and that one or two people could speak on behalf of each grouping, drew an angry response from Cllr Killilea, who accused the new ruling rainbow pact of Fine Gael and Independents of trying to introduce ‘censorship’.

Cllr Killilea said each councillor was elected by the people and was entitled to speak at each meeting on matters affecting the people who elected them to represent their needs.

Cllrs Mary Hoade (FF) and Tom Welby (Ind) said they had no problem with meetings starting later, so long as they had a set finish time. Cllr Hoade, the Fianna Fáil whip, said that in the past the Council didn’t have a quorum later on in the evening because members often had other engagements in the evenings. Cllr Welby accused former colleagues of his – whom he did not name – of coming into the chamber, making statements at the start of meetings that would be picked up by the Press, and then they would leave having got their ‘soundbite’.

It was agreed the next meeting – on Monday, July 22 – would begin at 1pm and finish at 6pm.

Chief Executive of the Council, Kevin Kelly, said a Corporate Policy Group would look over the Summer at how Council and Municipal Districts conduct their business, including the length and frequency of meetings. This will report back in September, he said.