The first is – it was £1 billion a couple of years ago. It’s considerably less now. The MoD regularly misplaces greater sums and has nothing to show for it. Two-fifths of the population use libraries at any given time and, if you remember that different people use them at different times in their lives, the real figure is far greater. Take into account inflation as well and there’s been at a far greater cut in funding over the last couple of years than decline in use. You are right, of course, that adult book usage of libraries has been falling. Online and children’s usage tells a different story though. I see the decline in adult usage as a challenge to reverse and – also – a nation’s (and the profession’s) shame rather than something to accept and to make worse. I realise that this is not popular thinking amongst those who think we should cut until there is nothing else to cut and that spending money to help others is simply slowing down the race to the bottom that seems so fashionable these days. I hope that the current prevailing ideology that sees giving a chance to others as wasteful may change one day. In the meantime, I am keen to report on its effects.

The £1 million was from a private source, not from tax payers and the description was intended to draw to attention the fact that money is being spent on big centrepiece libraries rather than the local branch libraries that are actually the ones under threat.

There are a few uncomfortable truths about libraries, their actual popularity and their funding, but woe betide anyone who raises these issues! You’re name will be be mud, and a thousand 20-something academic librarians, with nothing to do but live on twitter, will tweet your damnation from here to eternity.