Investigation ordered into sound 'annoyance' at Sunderland's £42million City Hall

Meetings of Sunderland City Council transferred to City Hall in late-2021 as councillors and staff started a phased move from the old Civic Centre to a replacement HQ at Riverside Sunderland.

However, a number of meetings since then have seen complaints from both councillors and members of the public about audio quality in the multi-purpose council chamber space.

At a full council meeting in June, 2022, Sunderland City Council’s leader, councillor Graeme Miller, stressed the issue applied to a small percentage of council meetings.

While “teething problems” with the new City Hall building may be expected, Cllr Miller explained, he added poor audio quality in the council chamber was “unacceptable” and that work was under way to resolve issues.

At the most recent meeting of full council on January 25, 2023, it was revealed that the local authority has commissioned an independent consultant to review sound quality as part of plans to upgrade the council chamber space.

City leaders confirmed that the council will foot the bill for this, rather than City Hall owners Legal and General, as the local authority has responsibility for “facilities management”.

Councillor Paul Stewart, Labour cabinet secretary, confirmed the independent review in response to a question from Liberal Democrat councillor Ciaran Morrissey.

Cllr Morrissey had asked whether company Legal and General, which funded and owns City Hall, would “reimburse the council for the catalogue of problems and failures with the building, including the need to employ an independent consultant to examine the acoustics in the chamber”.

Cllr Stewart, responding, said the contractors procured to build City Hall, Bowmer and Kirkland, had “undertaken rectifications across the building at no additional cost to the council”.

In relation to the council chamber, it was confirmed that existing AV support contractor GVAV had “made checks and changes to improve the sound quality in the space”.

Cllr Stewart continued: “Feedback on sound quality across the chamber is now much more positive and consistent from the majority of users.

“In the last couple of months, the only issue raised has been around uncharged microphones and the power pack for this has been checked and the incident has not reoccurred.

“In relation to your latter point, as the chamber is being used more frequently by a range of different internal and external users, additional requirements have been identified.

“For example, the use of lapel microphones to enable speakers to move freely across the whole space within this chamber.

“If we’re looking to upgrade the current system, it would seem appropriate to review what additional benefits are available as technology is always improving.

“It’s therefore timely for us to get sound quality assessed independently across a range of different chamber set ups so that we have the accurate data on the sound range and quality produced through a range of different mediums as part of that upgrading”.

Cllr Stewart added: “In terms of payment for this work, City Hall is owned by Legal and General and we lease the building from them.

“Under our lease agreement, we’re responsible for providing the facilities management (FM) for the site and adding and testing of equipment would come under that budget that we have set aside as part of our FM responsibilities.”

When audio problems were last discussed at full council in June, 2022, Labour councillor Mel Speding said failing to resolve issues could impact local democracy and “disenfranchise” councillors and residents.

Conservative councillor Pam Mann also said it was important that councillors were able to hear legal advice from council officers during meetings.

Speaking after the meeting in June 2022, a Sunderland City Council spokesperson, said: “We are aware that there have been a very small number of meetings where there have been quality issues with the sound in the council chamber.

“The council is working with its audio visual partner to ensure that any issues are resolved as quickly as possible.”

In some public council meetings since then, audio quality has been raised as an issue in the council chamber.

This included a meeting of the East Sunderland Area Committee, held in December, 2022, which was disrupted after it was discovered multiple microphones did not work as the batteries were flat.

Concerns about audio in the council chamber have also been raised at the council’s main scrutiny panel, the Scrutiny Co-ordinating Committee.

Labour councillor David Snowdon, speaking at a committee meeting in December 8, 2022, said he was surprised that City Hall had been recognised at the British Council for Offices Awards.

Official council minutes from the meeting recorded the councillor’s “annoyance that issues in respect of the acoustics in the council chamber and the broken audio visual system in Committee Room 1 had still not been satisfactorily addressed.”

Cllr Snowdon, speaking at the December meeting, added: “There are some glaring issues wrong with this [building] which is being rented out over a 35-year period and they should have been put right in my view.

“If I bought a house and I had so many problems with this house, I would have been onto somebody and I would have got it put right — not a year later.”

Council chiefs have now confirmed a consultant will undertake “site testing” at City Hall in February, 2023.