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I come from a large, isolated, rural county with some of the lowest property values and average salaries in the UK. Much of Lincolnshire's population lives in small villages, with no access to museums and art galleries. Those living in London can enjoy such cultural treats only a short walk or tube ride away; my local Waterstones is 25 miles from my front door.
We have 44 libraries serving more than 1 million people. Our local council aims to slash that number to 15 and shorten opening hours as well. These libraries are no grand stone edifices: they are often equivalent of local village shops. The council proposes one tiny library to serve every 66,667 people.
Our majority Conservative council suggests the 29 libraries it is targeting should either be run by volunteers for six hours a week or traded in for fortnightly mobile library visits. Hundreds of households will be offered a tier four service, what I would deem "end of the line" provisions, with a mobile library visiting for just one hour a month.
It makes sense to have a moral reaction to the closing of libraries: literacy underscores the universal declaration of human rights, including the right to education, the right to work and the right to freedom of opinion and expression. But I wonder, too, whether these proposals make economic sense.
In Britain, where 16% of adults are functionally illiterate, trained librarians and fully stocked libraries play a vital role in educating both children and adults, which enables social mobility and supports efforts to end child poverty, something the UK government promised to do by 2020.
For Lincolnshire, with high unemployment levels and median wages hovering at £16,000-£19,000, social mobility is key to economic growth. Citizens need to self-educate, train and retrain and have access to jobsearch resources online.
A third of people on jobseeker's allowance in the county are 16-24, and £9,000 per annum university fees can be intimidating and impractical. It is free public services that pick up the slack, allowing young people access to an education.
Economic growth relies on a literate public, social mobility and innovation, and so, too, does our benefits system. Libraries are free, accessible education, preparing the unemployed and young people for the world of work and saving us untold millions on benefits and jobseeker's allowance.
Let's not forget they also encourage a love of books and reading, something that is both wonderfully pleasurable and underscores Britain's world-class publishing industry.
These cuts do not make sense from an economic perspective. Libraries are worth more to the taxpayer in the long term than the council will save in the short term by closing them.
Lincolnshire county councillors here demonstrate a typically Conservative response to economic adversity, which is to suggest that by ceasing to invest in our country, our people and our public services, our economy will somehow grow. Their policy is to invest less and still expect gains.
Has it not occurred to this council that their goal should be to encourage library use? They should be introducing more convenient opening hours, better accessibility, educational and events programming with music, theatre, film showings, partnerships with schools, colleges, universities, local businesses. Such spending could easily be justified.
I urge the council to reconsider its plans, and I urge councillors to think of our local community as their local community, fellow Britons, and to sign the petition to save Lincolnshire's libraries.
As journalist Walter Cronkite once said: "Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation."
Follow the campaign to save Lincolnshire's Libraries @savelincslibs
Abigail Tarttelin is the author of novel Golden Boy, published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson
