‘Magnificent seven’ councillors in Laois demand their own meeting room

THERE appears to be no room, or very little room, at the inn for seven councillors in Laois when it comes to them, meeting ahead of council meetings.

Laois County Council comprises of 19 councillors. Seven now want their own meeting room in County Hall.

Following the results of the local election in Laois last June Fianna Fáil returned six councillors while Fine Gael returned five. Seven others that comprised of one Labour and six independent councillors formed a ‘Technical Group’ while one Independent councillor, Ollie Clooney decided to remain outside any party or group setting.

At the March meeting of Laois County Council the Technical Group, made up of cllr Marie Tuohy (Lab) and Independent cllrs Tommy Mulligan, Aidan Mullins, James Kelly, Aisling Moran, Ben Brennan and Caroline Dwane Stanley demanded they be given access to an adequate sized room where they could meet to devise strategies ahead of council meetings.

Raising the subject cllr Moran said: “We’re the largest grouping in the council at the moment. We have seven, Fianna Fail has six and Fine Gael has five. We have no meeting room. There’s nowhere where we can bring in anyone. It’s nearly a year since we were elected.” 

She went on to say that the council’s director of services Donal Brennan: “Promised us that we would have something within a couple of months, and we’re still waiting.” 

Cllr Paddy Bracken (FF) asked: “Are ye all in the one group,” to which cllr Moran replied: “We are. And we’re bigger than ye are.” 

Cllr Moran continued: “At the moment there’s three rooms. Two that are big and one that is small. Maybe the smallest group (Fine Gel) go into the small room and the two biggest groups (Fianna Fáil and Technical Group) go into the big rooms.” 

Cllr Dwane Stanley said: “It’s a very important issue. That (small) room was got back in the day for a small Technical Group of five. The problem is that there are seven of us now. And the room is too small.” “You can’t breath in it,” said cllr Moran.

“I’m not looking to put anyone out of their room,” said cllr Dwane Stanley, “not out of the Fianna Fáil or the Fine Gael room. But we shouldn’t be left waiting almost 12 months.” 

“That’s good, we won’t be leaving anyway,” said cllr Bracken.

Cllr Dwane Stanley said: “We get the use of the Local Enterprise Office room once a month. But if we have to bring anybody in we have to sit at the top of the (public) reception area to talk to them about their personal details.” Cathaoirleach of the council cllr Pádraig Fleming suggested that the technical group of councillors were welcome to use the Cathaoirleach’s Room to hold private discussions with their constituents.

While the technical group thanked the cathaoirleach for his offer, they nonetheless pursued the issue of obtaining their own room.

“We were fobbed off,” said cllr Dwane Stanley, kind of told ye can put up with what ye have.” 

Mr Brennan said: “We have separate rooms we call the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael rooms. Outside of council meeting days those rooms tend to be well used for interviews or for other meetings. They are not available to the different parties outside council meeting days.

“Since the (local) elections the Technical Group had been facilitated with a meeting room, the Local Enterprise Office meeting room. There is a shortage of meeting rooms in the building. There isn’t a meeting room available. It was a wish list of mine that the meeting room would be transferred into another meeting room. At the moment there could be staff moving into that room for a couple of weeks. It would be my hope, depending what we do with other works, to transfer that into another meeting room.” 

Mr Brennan said that in one section of the council, “staff are hot-desking (desks are used by different staff at different times), because there’s not enough room in rooms for them at the moment.” 

Cllr James Kelly said that in Bloom HQ in Mountrath, “we have different meeting rooms that are called like Glenbarrow or Glenvalley. I think each of the meetings rooms we have in County Hall should have a name that pertains to the county. We shouldn’t be calling them The Technical Group meeting room or the Fianna Fáil of Fine Gael meeting rooms. Have a nice name outside the rooms.”

“We already have a nice name outside one, It’s called the Fine Gael room,” said cllr Paddy Buggy.

“I think that’s a terrible arrogant thing to say, a statement like that. It’s like you have a Fianna Fáil and a Fine Gael room and to hell with seven members,” said cllr Dwane Stanley.

Calming matters down the council’s executive officer Michael Rainey said that he recognizes the issue the Technical Group has raised and said: “We are under a lot of office space pressure. We do need to develop another meeting room, which will be available to you to use for your Technical Group meetings and assigned to you on meeting days. In terms of naming the rooms that will be a matter for the council’s Corporate Policy Group.”