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[Press Release: November 9th, 2004] De Burca proposes motion that all Council meetings should be recorded for public viewingAt last Monday's meeting of Wicklow County Council, Green Party councillor, Deirdre de Burca, put down a motion calling on her fellow councillors to agree to allow for all future meetings of Wicklow County Council to be audio and video-recorded. The Green councillor also proposed that Wicklow County Council should set itself a six-month target for having live recordings of council meetings available on its website for members of the public to watch."I believe that this would be a very important step for the Council to take to improve public awareness of its activities and to allow members of the public an opportunity to have a greater understanding of the decisions it is taking" she says. "These meetings are public meetings, with media and members of the public present, and it is only one step further to make recordings available to members of the public so that they can monitor what their elected representatives are doing in their name. After all the proceedings of the Dail and the Seanad are recorded and there appears to be no good reason why local government should be excluded from this practice". Councillor de Burca says that she understands that this proposal may involve a change for some of her colleagues who are used to things being done in more traditional ways. "It will be very important for us to debate this issue fully and openly and also to seek feedback from our constituents about what they think of the idea" she says. "We speak a lot about openness and transparency in local government and this is a really concrete way of improving both. I also believe that the kind of behviour in the council which the media has reported so much on recently, and which reflects poorly on the councillors, would improve dramatically if we knew that our performances were being recorded for public viewing". The Green councillor has also stated her intention to submit a similar motion to Bray Town Council for its consideration.
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