AQW 47161/11-15 Written question to the Assembly Commission
To ask the Assembly Commission for an assessment of the use of headsets during tours of Parliament Buildings, to enhance the visitor experience.
Asked by Claire Sugden MLA on 12 June 2015
- Answered
- Written
- After due date
- Priority
- Tabled
- 12 June 2015
- Answer due by
- 17 June 2015
- Answered
- 22 June 201510 days after tabling
- Department
- Northern Ireland Assembly Commission
- Priority question
- Yes
Answer
In order to enhance its visitor experience, the Northern Ireland Assembly purchased in 2011 headsets designed to support tour guides with large and/or hearing impaired groups during tours. As stated on the “Tour of Parliament Buildings Booking Form”, headsets for guests with hearing impairments are available from the Events Office. The form is available on the Assembly’s website.
In terms of providing translation for visitors, the Events office will always work with event organisers to provide information on translation services and contacts. Currently, we are not resourced to provide the service in-house due to the vast number of languages potentially requested and, requests are rare: indicative of 1 or 2 per year for tours. Therefore it would be cost prohibitive to provide a full translation service and / or headsets at this stage. However, the Northern Ireland Assembly provides tour brochures in 11 different languages also available from the Events Office, namely: Polish, Lithuanian, Irish (Gaelic), Portuguese, Slovak, Chinese, German, Italian, French, Spanish & Ulster Scots.
The Northern Ireland Assembly is also exploring the feasibility of developing an “app” designed to provide a translation service during tours.