A live stream policy at Lagan Valley Island has been labelled “madness” as the chamber enters its fourth year of a shut-down on public cameras.

Lisburn and Castlereagh City Council’s recent corporate committee was told that a new director was “just through the door” to resolve long-running transparency concerns.

The local authority pulled the plug on public streaming of its committees in October 2022, with a motion to get cameras rolling again approved in February 2025.

Councillor Kurtis Dickson said: “I had previously asked for an update on the matter of live streaming council meetings and had requested a report late last year. I was told that we would have that at the start of this year.

Alderman Paul Porter has said the council's policy against streaming meetings is 'madness'. Pic credit: LCCC

placeholder image — Alderman Paul Porter has said the council's policy against streaming meetings is 'madness'. Pic credit: LCCC

“It would be good to see some movement on this and a paper brought back.”

In comparison, other NI local authorities such as Belfast and Newry, Mourne and Down live stream all of their committees and full council meetings.

The lack of public viewing access has also revealed that elected members in Lisburn and Castlereagh are being restricted from uploading their own recording of live democracy from the chamber.

Currently the monthly full council meeting is live streamed, but recording of the images is “strictly prohibited” according to the council website.

Alderman Paul Porter said: “There are other councils where live video of decisions have been made by councillors and uploaded online to their social media, but here at Lagan Valley we can’t show anything for three to four days.

“With almost 25 years of service as a councillor, I find this situation madness.

"For a council or councillor to remain relevant to their ratepayers, people need to do more than just read what we post on Facebook, they need to hear what we say in the council chamber.

“At present, if a resident doesn’t listen live during a full council meeting, they have no way of knowing what their councillors actually said.

“That’s because of outdated standing orders which prevent the public from easily accessing the debate afterwards.

“It’s time to move with the times. The public should be able to see the elected members who are speaking up on behalf of residents and also see which councillors never speak during full council meetings.

"I am calling for standing orders to change and for elected members to be able to report the comments made sure a council meeting.”

Standing orders are an agreed set of details on how council meetings are organised and run.

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CEO David Burns responded: “We now have a new director of corporate services started just last week and we actually discussed this very on a one ot one basis.

“I need the officer to have the opportunity to get a feel for how local government works.

“Other officers have been doing work on this behind the scenes, but even for our new head of communications, just through the door, there is a bit of work to do in understanding local government more generally, to ensure what we bring forward is something that we can all stand over.”