Tag Archives: libraries

Don’t close public libraries

The closure threat to public libraries across Scotland has highlighted a major flaw in the funding of local authorities. Chronic underfunding over the last 14 years, has resulted in a year-on-year hunt around budget time to find services to cuts.

No where is this better illustrated than in the situation around public libraries, that have been seen as soft targets, and those servicing rural and coastal communities are seen as fair game for savings. In urban areas where there may be several library branches within a city or large town it is an issue, but in the rural and coastal towns the nearest library may be several miles away. In cities the nearest branch that may be a bus ride away, in the rural and coastal areas that bus ride may be hours and on limited timetables.

When a library is closed in a rural or coastal locations it is lost forever.

At a business debate on public libraries in Holyrood on the 5th of February, one contribution by an MSP who had been a local councillor stood out. He noted that when he became a councillor he was subjected to several presentations around funding and budgets.

To quote from the transcript of the meeting; ‘the first week we were there, the chief executive took us all to the side, all us councillors and we had presentation after presentation after presentation that told me they had no money I had to cut budgets there was nothing I could do, and it was all frontline services.

A shocking indictment on how local government operates, and how democratically elected councillors are being treated.

Libraries are the last free, safe civic spaces available to communities. They are havens for those who are seeking to learn and better themselves. Public libraries need to be protected.

Libraries should be seen as an asset to local authorities and not just a cost centre.

In the past, when economic pressures such as the depression of the 1930’s and post WWII period, governments invested in public libraries as a means of sparking regeneration.

Posted in Op-eds | 8 Comments

Scottish Lib Dems’ Joe McCauley criticises SNP over Angus Robertson book event

It’s been an embarrassing weekend for Scotland’s Culture Minister Angus Robertson. The SNP MSP has pulled out of a promotional event for his new book which had been paid for by a grant for his own department.

From the Sunday Mail: 

But Angus Robertson cancelled his appearance last night – after the Sunday Mail started asking about the £30,000 handed to it by a group under his remit.

The Cabinet Secretary for the Constitution, External Affairs and Culture had been due to appear at the Borders Book Festival to plug Vienna – The International Capital.

The event was awarded the significant grant in August from Creative Scotland – a government- funded and accountable body ­falling under Robertson’s brief.

He has now cancelled the lecture and an advert was quickly removed from the festival website after this newspaper began asking questions about it.

In the newspaper’s report, the first opposition party quote, and it was a blistering one, goes to Scottish Lib Dem Culture Spokesperson Joe McCauley. The SNP’s cutting of cultural services in Glasgow was not lost on him:

“At the same time as the SNP takes a scythe to cultural centres in Glasgow, the Culture Secretary is trying to plug his book at a taxpayer-funded literary event.

Posted in News | Also tagged , , , and | 8 Comments

In other news… Lib Dems close no libraries, Paddick pledges 360,000 homes, & Newby is new Lords whip

Here’s a round-up of stories we haven’t had time to cover on the site this past few days…

Tim Farron: No library closed under Lib Dem leadership (LibDems.org.uk)

Last year, more than 40 libraries were closed by Conservative and Labour councils. In stark contrast, for the second year in a row, no Liberal Democrat-controlled council in England and Wales closed any library. Liberal Democrat-controlled Cardiff is opening five new libraries and Portsmouth and Bristol are also opening new libraries.

Tim Farron said: “Cutting services like Labour and Tory councils are doing will do long-term damage. Liberal Democrats are doing the right

Posted in News | Also tagged , , , , , and | 1 Comment

Opinion: A visit to the library

Every Christmas Eve throughout my childhood, a mystery visitor came to the doorstep of our council flat and deposited a bag of children’s books before disappearing into the darkness. S/he never stopped to be recognised or thanked, and we never found out who s/he was, but I still remember the thrill of opening up another consignment of new reading every Christmas.

Even without our mystery benefactor, however, I and my three siblings would have been brought up with books. My father left school at 14 to be …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , and | 1 Comment

Opinion: Tory school plans will give parents nightmares

Monday’s Today Programme on Radio 4 majored on local government.

It was the usual shambles. We were told that local authorities were expecting to make cuts in services – hardly news. One reporter told us that libraries were not used by many people – in fact had she spent ten minutes on research she would have discovered that libraries are visited by half the adult population each year. This makes libraries far more popular than any if not all of the sporting events on which the BBC lavishes time and our money each year.

Another reporter told us that local authorities …

Posted in Local government and Op-eds | Also tagged , , , and | 3 Comments
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