'If we go back to before Covid, when we had press and public in the gallery, we had really big issues, we had 10 or 12 members of the public at the meetings and we can't go back to the day where we are seen as closing the doors on that.'
Transparency concerns have been raised as a Northern Ireland council seeks to cut back on its staffing resources for the media.
READ MORE: Newry, Mourne & Down deputy chairman fails to gain 'public apology' over International Women's Day speaker row. "If we remove the video option then we can revert back to one democratic services officer per meeting."We are currently in the process of getting that up and running and will look to recruit through our IT department someone who can actually operate it like a broadcasting system."
However, NMDDC deputy chairperson, Gareth Sharvin raised his concerns that the online resource was a heavy demand on staff having to attend multiple meetings."At the moment we have two full time democratic services staff members having to attend every meeting to provide the online service, and that is a massive resource demand on what is already a stretched area of the council.
"The staff of the council also need a balance of life. Every committee and council meeting is at 6pm and add on planning, which is a full day as well as special council meetings, that is quite a heavy demand on democratic services.
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