Editorial

News includes the frightening news that South Ayrshire may be closing all their libraries. That seems like an exaggeration to me … let’s see what the real story is when it emerges.  Further south, Bromley is looking at six libraries being “community-managed”.  That phrase can mean a lot of things, from basically “volunteer-run” to volunteers raising funds for a mix of paid and volunteer staff.  In other news, the Guardian reminds Ed Vaizey that he has agreed to debate Alan Gibbons and lists recent cuts announced.  The one about Hertfordshire, though, understates the problem – it’s not just “cuts to mobile libraries” but rather closing all seven of them.  Finally, my thanks to Devon for this view from one of their libraries – it may not be on the beach like Scilly but it’s still darn good.

View from Ilfracombe Library – not bad, my friends, not bad

Changes

• Bromley – Burnt Ash, Hayes, Mottingham, Shortlands, Southborough and St Paul’s Cray to be “community-managed”
• South Ayrshire – “All libraries may close” 14 buildings and 1 mobile under threat.
• South Lanarkshire – Calderwood Library to close.

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Editorial

One week after the election and things are still quiet, although it’s hard to say the mood is optimistic …

Changes

• Brent – Library visits up 40% (now 2 million).
• Wiltshire – 2 out of 4 mobile libraries to be withdrawn. 2.5 mile limit for stops, frequency halved.

Ideas

• Social and health care workers as housebound book deliverers.

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Editorial

So now we know: the Conservatives will not only be a partner in a coalition but, to the surprise of almost all, the holders of a parliamentary majority.  Most librarians I know are fairly depressed or shocked by this but we will need to at some point work out what this means for the sector and how we will respond it.  Here are my (completely uninformed and random) thoughts:

• There will continue to be deep cuts to public library budgets, probably on the order of 20 to 50%, depending on local authority, over the term of this new parliament. This is similar to what has happened in the last parliament but will seem, if anything, to have more impact due to the service already having been cut. Councils will be desperate to save money any which way and so there will be as great as pressure as ever to put as many services as possible into council buildings – expect libraries to move into council offices, or vice versa, at an accelerated pace.
• There’s going to be a lot of announcements of changes, for which read cuts, over the next year or so as councils push through decisions that have been delayed until the uncertainty of this election.
• Volunteer libraries – which have been growing quickly in number but are rather unsupported and individual – will be increasingly assisted by local councils and, especially, national government.  This will take the form of best practice, guides and expert advice and perhaps central funding.  This will be necessary as more and more libraries (another 500? more?) are given the option of closing or having the paid staff removed.
• The government will work at reducing the ease with which legal challenges can be made. This will reduce the power of local communities to challenge cuts to libraries in court and allow councils to reduce services with little regard to pressure, beyond concerns over adverse reactions at the next election.  This last will also not be a large feature as it is now clear that, when it comes down to it, insufficient people (both politicians and voters) care enough about public libraries for it to be an important electoral issue.
• Those working in public libraries will be given the choice of adapting to the new conditions (more council orientated work, supporting volunteers, etc) or leaving (either pre-emptively or via voluntary, even compulsory, redundancy). Being that many qualified librarians have already gone, the next five years may effectively mean the end of professionally qualified librarians being a requirement in most authorities and may spell the end of qualified public librarians as a significant force, even if they are now. “Fighting” of course, as has already been pointed out on Twitter, is also an option and will continue, as it has in the old parliament, although with a weakened impact now that the Government has a majority, although this may change closer in the next two years or so due to by-elections or closer to the next election. This campaigning may divide the profession, as seen currently in Manchester, where the decision has been made to exclude some protesters from the library, which has resulted in some fairly negative comments from the Guardian and from Voices for the Library.
• Whoever in central government is in charge of libraries (and it may well be Mr Vaizey again: we’ll soon find out even if it has not been announced by the time you read this) will be ideologically against intervention and will provide only limited, if at all, guidance to local authorities.  “Let a hundred localised flowers bloom” will be the order of the day, very much like it has been. It will be up to councils and others – notably the taskforce and the SCL – to do what they can.  It is likely that libraries will still remain under the Arts aegis (if Arts Council England survives) rather than in more politically important sectors like education.
• Heaven knows what will happen in Scotland.  The nation already feels notably different to the rest of the UK.
• If you’re in paid employment in a mobile library or a small library (and even in a larger one to a lesser extent – see the cull at the Library of Birmingham for example) then you’re going to be in constant doubt about your future for the next five years. One commentator has even done this amusing cartoon to suggest a possible (rather extreme but that’s the point of cartoons) future for mobiles…

Cartoon courtesy of @noHogarth

But, frankly, none of us really knows what will happen even in broad strokes, let alone in detail.  What I have said above is simply a continuation of what has gone before and life is rarely like that. I hope that my prognostications are proved amusing wrong in the next few years.  There remains the obvious success of public libraries (as reported today in the USA and Singapore) in other countries, where usage is increasing and – with growing inequalities between rich and poor, those online and not online – libraries are needed as never before.  There are also – sometimes competing – trends such as for the need for quiet study spaces, for out-of-school literacy and for creative workspaces that may yet give ammunition for the sector.  The only thing that we do know is that the current boss will think much the same as the old boss, but without a putatively more centrist partner, and you are best to draw your own conclusions from that.

Changes

• Cardiff – Central Library to receive 3D printer as part of £150k grant from Welsh Government.
• Gwynedd – £250k upgrade of Porthmadog Library due to Welsh Government grant.
• Hertfordshire – 7 (out of 7) mobile libraries to be withdrawn.
• North Yorkshire – Richmond tourist information centre moves into library.

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Editorial

The election is near and there’s still few comments, if any, on public libraries by politicians.  The one who has said something – Ed Vaizey – has, presumably as a joke, said that there’s been no major cuts to libraries and few closures.  Well done that man for putting the best possible spin on things at least.  Alan Gibbons calls him out on his figures, using Public Libraries News statistics., as does Private Eye.  And this is the thing, Ed knows the figures are there (he declined to use them himself recently, bizarrely arguing that because they include Scottish figures, they’re outside of his remit) that show he’s being economical with the truth but he’s still doing it because he thinks not enough people care or know to do him harm. Hardly the attitude you’d want for someone in charge of public libraries and an attitude he’d have criticised all over when he was in opposition.  My reading of him so far is that Mr Vaizey was one of the best shadow library ministers  and probably one of the worst library ministers in history.

Well done, therefore, to the 14,000 public library staff who have completed the SCL E-learning programme.  There were a few technical problems with one or two of the modules but it represents a vital first stage in getting all public library staff geared up and ready to help.  Such training needs to continue.  You may well know someone who works in a public library who still is not sure how to get someone an email address.  Such lack of skills does not help the library locally, nationally, the customer or indeed the member of staff themselves.  Well done to the SCL too of course.  It shows that, although limited in scope, such an organisation can actually do things.  Let’s hope they do more … and as much as possible of it publicly and not behind closed doors, as with their recent day on “alternative delivery models” for libraries.

By the way, did you know Amazon owned Abebooks? No, me neither, but they have been for seven years.

Changes

• St Helens – 22 out of 96 posts to be lost. £270k cut.

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Changes

• Peterborough – 15 voluntary redundancies mean compulsory redundancies not required.
• Sheffield – Plans for Woodseats Library to be closed, with the land being redeveloped into joint library/medical centre/pharmacy.

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