City council spends €1,200 on security for two meetings

Cork City Council spent approximately €1,200 hiring outside staff to provide security at two of the local authority’s meetings this week, one of which was cancelled due to a protest.

City Hall has confirmed that it is reviewing security arrangements following the abandonment of recent meetings of city councillors.

Cork City Council said it had employed 12 security staff at a cost of around €600 to manage Monday night’s abandoned meeting, and repeated the practice at City Hall on Tuesday, when councillors reconvened to hear the motions from the previous two meetings.

A spokesman for City Hall said that the meetings are usually staffed by two of the council’s own porters.

Monday night’s meeting of Cork City Council became the second meeting in as many weeks to be cancelled when Diarmaid Ó’Cadhla of the People’s Convention refused to leave the chamber.

Mr Ó’Cadhla said that his actions were in protest at the council’s decision to remove hundreds of posters his group had erected to advertise a march against water charges.

City Hall said that the posters were removed as they were put up without prior written permission, in violation of Section 19 (1) of the Litter Pollution Act. The People’s Convention dispute this however, and say that the council’s decision to remove the posters was a curtailment to their rights to protest.

The incident on Monday night followed a similar incident two weeks ago, when the city council’s meeting was abandoned after a group protesting the imprisonment of anti-water charge campaigners refused to leave the chamber.

The People’s Convention is to hold a march and rally in Cork this Saturday to promote a mass boycott of Irish Water.

Organisers say the event will start at Connolly Hall on Lapps Quay at 2pm.