New guidelines to ensure that all road signage is bilingual

SOME contractors working on roads  in the county may not be aware of their obligations under legislation to have signage erected in both  Irish and English.

Councillors were discussing the draft guidance document on the use of Irish for temporary traffic management on public roads at a recent  meeting of the local authority.

Cork County Council’s head of roads, Padraig Barret told councillors that the document is a response to a number of complaints from the public on the misuse of Irish or even the lack of Irish used by some companies working on the public roads around the county involved in licensed road openings.

‘We have taken a number of measures and we’re including in the licences that there is an obligation to ensure that both languages are used under the Official Language Act,’ said Mr Barrett.

‘We have also developed this additional document which is a guidance note and re-enforces the need that all signage going on roads  must be bilingual, while all signage in Gaeltacht areas has to be as Gaeilge’

Mr Barrett said that unfortunately they have had situations where Irish was not properly included or not included at all.

This document makes it clearer for everyone

Cllr Declan Hurley (Ind), who is chair of the roads and transportation SCP (strategic policy committee), welcomed the document but pointed out some anomalies that needed to be addressed.

‘This document is worded very well and reads very well not only for Cork County Council but also for bodies who are planning to do road works and where temporary road signs need to go up,’ said Cllr Hurley, who formally proposed its adoption.

Cllr Gobnait Moynihan (FF), who formally seconded the document, said that any time she has reported these errors to her local Municipal District, they are corrected fairly promptly.

Mr Barrett added that they will be issuing this document when they hand out any licences.