A council meeting any resident can follow
The session is already streamed. Adding languages means it is understood by people who live here and do not yet have the language it is debated in.
An administration that streams its sessions has the audio solved and accessibility half solved: it is live, it is public, and a share of residents do not understand it. In places with two official languages, the problem runs both ways.
Where the audio comes from
From the same desk that already feeds the stream. If the session is broadcast, that signal already exists and only has to be split off; the chamber microphones are not touched.
How it is set up
- 1
It is connected to the output that already feeds the broadcast.
- 2
The languages are set: the one the session runs in, and the ones to offer.
- 3
The link is published next to the stream, on the council's own site.
- 4
The transcript stays, with timings, and serves as a draft of the minutes.
Why it fits a public body
The minutes start written
Each session leaves a transcript with timings and who spoke. It does not replace the official minutes, but it saves whoever writes them the mechanical half.
Accessibility without building works
Nothing to install in the chamber if the session is already broadcast. The signal that exists is split.
Two official languages, both ways
Each direction can be open at once, and the second language costs 0.35 of the first.
Billed on speaking
A three-hour session with an hour and a half of speeches pays for an hour and a half. Votes and breaks do not.
Where the legal limit is
This is not a sworn translation and cannot be one: what comes out of it is for a resident to follow the session, not for a word to be challenged in court. The official minutes are still signed by whoever signs them today, and where the law requires an accredited translator, an accredited translator is required.
Questions people ask
- Does it work as official minutes?
- No. It is a draft with timings and who spoke, which saves the mechanical work of whoever writes them. The responsibility and the signature stay with a person.
- Can the transcript be published?
- It is yours and you decide. We neither publish it nor keep it beyond handing it over.
- Does it work with the chamber microphones?
- Yes, because what is taken is the mix already leaving the desk. If a councillor speaks without their microphone, it is not heard — just as it is not heard on the stream.
- What if two languages are mixed in the session?
- The session's language is configured. If they genuinely alternate, what works is one room per source language.