Hard of hearing residents interested in local democracy will be pleased with Lewisham Council’s plans to upgrade its meeting room’s sound systems.

This comes after the councillors on the business panel found committee room one and two were not fit for purpose and should be upgraded.

The councillors commented it was important that “members and the public attending meetings in the Council buildings are not disadvantaged

because of inadequate sound system provision,” according to council documents.

Improving the council’s sound systems was already noted in the local democracy review.

The council recently reviewed its audio-visual equipment, a spokeswoman said.

“We are committed to becoming even more open and transparent and increasing the ways residents can engage with local democracy,” she said.

“We recently completed a thorough review of the audio-visual equipment in the Council Chamber and committee rooms in the Civic Suite and identified areas for improvement. We are now in the process of upgrading various systems, including microphones and visual equipment, in these rooms.”

And the council’s local democracy working group will be looking into ways to improve access to decisions made at meetings, she said.

“In the coming months, the Local Democracy Working Group will be testing a range of channels to improve timely access to information about decision-making meetings, which will include webcasting.

"We hope to have all works completed by the end of July," she added.

Councillors reviewed Lewisham’s transparency and openness over the summer, making recommendations to the mayor and cabinet earlier this year.

The 57 recommendations include initiatives like making sure council reports are in ‘plain English’, improving the council’s online communications and “changing our language and behaviour to influence a culture change that embeds the idea of the citizen at the heart of all we do,” according to documents.