A council investigation is underway into a Royal Mail hold-up of hundreds of residents’ responses to surveys on Irish dual language street signs in Belfast.
The probe began after Belfast City Council staff noticed responses to surveys on having new dual language signs was “unusually low”.
As a result of the issue, no dual language street sign requests will be on the agenda for Belfast City Council to discuss this summer, it has been claimed.
Members of the council’s People and Communities Committee were told this week that postal irregularities were to blame.
A council officer told elected reps: “We became aware in June this year the response rates to our dual language street signs surveys were unusually low, and so we undertook significant investigation internally, and subsequently with Royal Mail.”
It was explained how the investigation found around 375 responses in pre-paid envelopes were being held by Royal Mail at a delivery centre, with an “unconfirmed number being sent through by Royal Mail to their return centre”.
The officer said Royal Mail had been unable to confirm the number sent to the return centre, and that the council was “aware of a handful of responses being sent back to the people who filled in the survey, because they have been contacting us”.
“Royal Mail are now returning the remaining mail held at the return centre to us, and we have received three batches of those to date, and we are expecting more, although the numbers are dwindling,” the officer added.
New signage that has already been passed by the committee and ratified at a monthly council meeting is unaffected.
“When we became aware of this as a potential issue, we paused processing the applications and surveys that were to be reported to this committee,” the officer said.
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There are currently 19 live surveys of residents ongoing, which will have to be carried out again.
“We are continuing to investigate the timeline around this, and the circumstances that led to this situation, and I will be bringing forward a report to consider steps to avoid this happening again in the future,” the officer added.
DUP councillor Sarah Bunting said the problem “further undermines the confidence in the process that many were already sceptical about”.
Under council rules introduced in 2022, just one resident or councillor is required to trigger a consultation on a street having dual language signage.
If 15% of residents back the new signage, it is proposed for installation, though subject to an equality impact assessment.
The previous rules required 33.3% of a street’s residents to trigger a survey, and 66.6% to agree to new signage before it was erected.
Although the vast majority of applications are for dual signage featuring English and Irish, other applications have been made for Ulster Scots, and even more surprising languages.
The council officer added of the live surveys: “It is the 19 we are currently out assessing where we will have to resurvey all of them.”
Sinn Féin councillor Róis-Máire Donnelly said: “We are well aware of the massive backlog, which the team is doing a great job of working through, but missing a month (of consultation) is concerning for us. There really needs to be a thorough investigation into this – it is really unacceptable that this lapsed, and it should have come to light before this.”
A Royal Mail spokesperson said: “We are not aware of this specific issue but will always investigate any concerns raised with us. If Belfast City Council can share further details, we will look into the matter.”