Roy Clare comment
Nov 2nd
Good, we all agree it is important not to slag off members of the public – aka ‘campaigners’.
However we may disagree about what the Minister is saying, as quoted by Laura: ‘Library users will be right to challenge where frontline services are closed if services haven’t thought about some radical efficiency options.’
Suggest we ought to read that as library services; not libraries. Current debates about ‘libraries’ too quickly become lines-in-sand about buildings.
Councillors count votes in terms of buildings; and staff count jobs in terms of buildings. But people want excellent services, which is partly about buildings, as welcoming civic spaces; plus easy (free) access to all forms of published media, expert advice and information, 24/7.
In some quarters a relentless, nimby-style focus on keeping open buildings prevents a proper examination of strategic opportunities. In too many places people are being denied library services because other people want to hang on to buildings.
Too few decision-makers have the vision, appetite and political skill to challenge and deal with this conundrum, which has now become the biggest threat to the survival of sustainable, popular library services in many places.
Roy
Roy Clare CBE
Chief Executive Officer
Museums Libraries & Archives Council
A new chapter for libraries?
Nov 2nd
New library blog
Nov 2nd
Here is an interesting new library blog:
http://use-libraries-and-learn-stuff.blogspot.com/2010/10/are-public-libraries-expensive-to-run.html?spref=fb -
Somerset authors letter
Nov 2nd
Ken Maddock, Council Leader
Somerset County Council
County Hall
Taunton
Somerset
TA1 4DY
2nd November 2010
Dear Ken Maddock
As local authors, living and working in Somerset, we wrote to you and to Christine Lawrence and all cabinet members on 17th September to voice our concerns about cutbacks to the library services.
Since then, we have had the opportunity to join focus groups to hear details of the County’s plans for the library service and to express our concerns and ideas.
Following that consultation, and a letter I received from Christine Lawrence dated 8th October, and having had time to digest the information received and consult with national leaders of the Campaign for the Book, I would like to explain our position on this question.
We understand the current financial constraints on the Council, and accept that savings will have to be made: we also understand that in a library service that has suffered such underfunding and neglect as has for several years been the case in Somerset, such savings are hard to find.
Therefore, we are prepared, as suggested by Ms Lawrence, to meet with her and any other appropriate elected representative or officer, to discuss creative ways in which the service can avoid branch closures and restriction of opening hours by the judicious use of appropriately trained volunteers supplementing professional library staff (what has been presented to us as the Community Supported Library option).
However, we are not prepared to accept the proposal to establish Community Libraries. As we understand it, this would mean taking a branch completely out of local authority control, removing professional staff, and cutting all links to Library Services – inter-library loans, the computer network and so on. We will vigorously oppose any attempt to enforce this option. Our reason for this is that a library without professional staff, and without access to properly constituted library services, is not a library at all. It is merely a collection of books on shelves.
We must remind the Council of its statutory obligations under the 1964 Museums and Libraries Act, and notify it of our intention to challenge cutbacks that leave any community inadequately supplied with a library service, under the provisions of that act.
We also ask Somerset County Council, in taking decisions about the future of the library service, to consider the needs of the most vulnerable in our society who, in times of financial hardship, need their libraries more than ever.
We await the announcement of the decisions taken at the meeting of the full council on 10th November with interest.
Yours sincerely
Steve Barlow
For and on behalf of
Jeremy Strong Sue Purkiss
Kathryn White Eileen Browne
A national digital library?
Nov 2nd
A warning from Ireland
Nov 2nd
Remember Ireland? This is where the slash and burn approach to climbing out of financial crash and recession was tried first. So is the Celtic Tiger roaring once more after a good shot of fiscal austerity and spending cuts?
Well, no. Debt costs have soared to record levels, house prices are falling and growth has stalled.
So what is the Irish government’s cure for all these self inflicted ills? You guessed, didn’t you? The Osborne approach there has failed so the Irish are going to double the next round of cuts from 7 billion Euros to 14 billion Euros. If it wasn’t so damned serious you would have to laugh.
Jobs to go at Hampshire and Harrow libraries
Nov 1st
FROM THE BOOKSELLER
Jobs go at Hampshire and Harrow libraries
01.11.10 | Benedicte Page
Fifty-eight full-time equivalent jobs are set to go at Hampshire library service, amid further cuts and protests about threats to library services.
The job losses come in a bid to reduce the annual running costs of Hampshire’s service by £1.5m and follow a consultation with staff and unions over the planned restructure. However, no libraries will be closed, and opening hours will be increased in some libraries so that they no longer close at lunchtimes. The latest Discovery Centre, in Basingstoke, will open on 30th November.
Hampshire county council’s executive member for culture and recreation Margaret Snaith-Tempia said the proposed restructure does not affect “many” front line staff who deal with the public on a day to day basis, and efficient new working practices plus the introduction of self service terminals would free staff up “to help with customer enquiries and continue running children’s activities, reading groups and assist people using computers.
She added: “Restructuring a service as big as this needs to be approached as a series of phases. This fundamental restructure will make the service sustainable without using money that should be allocated for buying books.”
Meanwhile, 34 members of staff in Harrow’s library service are to lose their jobs following a restructure caused in part by the introduction of self-service machines, according to a report in the Harrow Observer. Eleven libraries will be affected by the job losses.
Councillor Rekha Shah (Labour), Harrow Council’s portfolio holder for community and cultural services, told the newspaper: “We care passionately about libraries in Harrow and that is why we are fighting to keep them open by introducing self service technology. We want to protect them but government cuts mean that we have to be realistic, with less money in the pot to provide the services our residents need.”
Furthermore, Oldham’s libraries are to have a 25% funding cut over the next five years, according to a report in the Oldham Chronicle.
Relocating libraries and the increased use of volunteers are both elements in the plan to reshape the service, with a council report stating: “A very clear starting point for the discussions is that the service is much more than books and buildings — these are simply tools of the trade.”
Over 200 people are reported to have set off from Crofton Park library in Lewisham to march to Lewisham Town Hall on Saturday (30th October) to protest over the proposed closure of five Lewisham libraries.
Report of Lewisham march
Nov 1st
“We gathered from all corners of Lewisham in cheerful and carnival mood. The sun finally blazed down from the arctic blue sky and blessed us until we reached the darkening portals of the Town Hall There was something medieval in the brightly coloured clothes, the dressed up children of all ages, the whistles, the drum, the horn. We were truly a motley crew. The lead was eventually taken by the coffin in which lay the body of Lewisham libraries, carried by the appropriately attired pall bearers.
Do look at the photo, and see who leapt aboard Sir Steve’s ship, the coffin. Who are they? They be Cllr Curran, who stands to lose Sydenham Library in his ward and has made a good fist of supporting his constituents, thus far. Heidi Alexander, MP for Lewisham East, where both Grove Park Library and Blackheath Village Library may close and Joan Ruddock, MP for Deptford which has Crofton Park and New Cross Library to close. The latter two did not march, but Cllr Curran did while distributing his leaflets, but then he had news for us all, outside the Town Hall…..
Off we set, in remarkably good humour, whistles blowing, chanting slogans and making them up as we went along. It was noisy, we held up the traffic and the traditional police escort handled us extremely well, even on our journey down the South Circular. They deserve our thanks, but we, in return, were biddable, as London Folk are.
“No ifs, no buts, no library cuts.” We have had that before. Then, my partner on the Pensioner banner introduced “Steve Bullock here us say, library closures, no way!” The children blew their whistles to match the chants!
Not quite “Battlestar Galactica and her rag tag fleet” but, the car horns were hooting, bus passengers waved and grinned, residents opened their windows and peeped from their front doors, shopkeepers left their businesses We were noisy and drew attention to ourselves.
Cllr Maines was there at the beginning and Cllr Morrison managed to help with a banner, making it to our destination. Cllr Clarke skipped along with the marchers. When you consider how many wards are affected by these closures it was surprising to see so few councillors. If any other was there and has been omitted, let us know, and we will ensure your name is recorded for posterity.
About 160 set off from Crofton Park and those unable to do the 2 mile walk, or not having enough time, joined us outside the Town Hall. One young woman with child and sleeping baby was amazed at herself, “I have never done anything like this before,” she confided.
As we approached we were overshadowed by the Council buildings and the air grew cold. People waiting in droves for busses on one side of the road just gawped. This is all getting very Pied Piper, but, we were not swallowed up, we stood our ground and listened, finally, in disbelief, to Cllr Curran. He urged us on, encouraged our campaign but finished by saying that whatever happened he would vote for the proposed Council Budget (whatever is in it?)
How fitting to finish on that note. He has diligently and consistently backed his constituents in their campaign, advising them well. But, when push comes to shove…….”
Congratulations to the organisers. This takes much hard work and dedication, but, then libraries are important. How can we call ourselves a civilised society and deprive little kids (and bigger kids, too) of something so precious? Just a political comment, how many better libraries would you get for the near half a billion extra we will have to stump up for the EU?
Patricia Richardson
Minutes Secretary LLL
Secretary of the Users and Friends of Manor House Library
The price is not right
Nov 1st
This article was written by Tom Holland, Chair of the Society of Authors in The Bookseller:
The price is not right01.11.10
Cutting government support for writers was never going to make a major contribution towards balancing the nation’s books. With Public Lending Right being allocated £7.45m per year by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and with a few grants from the Arts Council being thrown in, the total sum saved would barely have been sufficient to keep an aircraft-carrier in nuts and bolts.
Nevertheless, PLR is precious to writers. Although modest by the standards of government support for literature in other European countries, and despite being capped at £6,600, it can make an important contribution to a writer’s income. This was why, despite appreciating the challenges faced by the DCMS, the Society of Authors invited writers to sign a statement urging Jeremy Hunt, the culture secretary, to take into account that PLR is a statutory right—not to mention a frontline service. Four thousand five hundred writers duly did so.
Bearing in mind the full swingeing scale of cuts in the public sector, we were not immoderately disappointed to learn that PLR funding is to fall by around 6% over the next four years—equivalent to something like 15% in real terms. Realistically, I suppose, we could not have hoped for much better.
Which is not to say, however, that all is joy unconfined. In mid-October, DCMS announced that, as part of its contribution to the so-called bonfire of the quangos, the responsibilities of the PLR Office would be transferred to “another body”. The government’s stated aim in eliminating 19 of its 55 public bodies was “to increase transparency, accountability and efficiency”. Unfortunately for writers the effect of abolishing PLR will be precisely the opposite.
The Registrar of PLR, Jim Parker, and his staff of nine in Stockton-on-Tees run an impeccably courteous and efficient service. The running costs have been reduced sharply in the last couple of years. Naturally, it would be wonderful if the costs could be reduced still further—and yet in truth, it is very hard to see that there is more fat to be cut, given the need to run a registry, collect library loans data from all over Britain, and make payments to 24,000 authors every year. It is only fair to add that members, as soon as we alerted them to this misconceived proposal, sent in a flurry of emails confirming that the PLR Office is by far the most efficient public service with which they ever have dealings.
If the plan cannot be stopped—and the Society of Authors hopes that it still can—then a way must be found to ensure that the PLR Office, in whatever mutated form it is to take, continues to provide a first class and highly economical service to authors. Certainly, it would be ironic, and yet not wholly surprising, if an attempt to cut running costs only resulted in bureaucracy and inefficiency.
Harrow ‘passionate about libraries’
Oct 31st
Harrow council claims to be passionate about libraries:
http://www.harrowtimes.co.uk/news/8485558.Council__cares_passionately__after_axing_library_posts/