Author: Sue Morgan
Friends Write To Committee Over Inquiry Into Library Closures
3:06 pm Friday, 24th February, 2012, Isle of Wight
ShortURL: http://wig.ht/29mH
Read More- Budget Cuts, Community, Island-wide, Isle of Wight Council, Letter to the Editor, Library, Ventnor, Volunteering
Friends of Ventnor Library have submitted a response to The Sport, Media and Culture Committee’s Inquiry into the Closure of Libraries, following Cllr David Pugh’s appearance before it. In their own words. Ed
Dear Committee
We should like to comment on Mr Pugh’s appearance before the Inquiry and to comment generally.
Firstly, Mr Pugh gave the impression that on the Isle of Wight volunteers were happy and willing to step forward to run Community libraries. In fact there was a great reluctance to step into this role; people felt forced to volunteer or lose a treasured local resource, as it was made clear that the IoW CC would close the facility.
“Fatigue and resentment”
There are on-going concerns about volunteer fatigue and resentment that this policy has been enforced in rural areas.
Although Mr Pugh repeatedly referred to himself as a volunteer at his community library, we gather that his volunteering thus far has been of very limited extent.
In addition, he suggested that library staff were very happy to train volunteers. In fact library staff all around the island were very unhappy to be training volunteers to replace their own roles while decisions were pending as to which staff would be sacked or retained. They were unable to protest, but nevertheless did a professional job of training volunteers.
No trained staff at Community libraries
As Mr Pugh admitted, Community run libraries have no access to trained staff, an issue of particular concern in relation to promoting and supporting children and needy members of the public in their reading.
The funding of community libraries is particularly problematic. As was made clear to the Inquiry, the parish councils where these community libraries are located have had to increase the local precept to make a contribution towards running the libraries—in effect double taxation.
“Huge financial burden”
However, this still leaves the local community with a huge burden of fundraising, which is particularly difficult in areas of low family income and high rates of unemployment.
These libraries have no security in long term planning. If for any reason these community run libraries were to close the remaining council run libraries would have to serve those communities despite the reduction in opening hours that they have incurred.
Pugh rejects Public Libraries and Museums Act
We note that Mr Pugh urged that the Public Libraries and Museums Act with its reference to a comprehensive and efficient service was no longer necessary and that the Localism Bill would allow local planning suited to the needs of the area.
However, with no agreed definition of a comprehensive service this leaves rural communities and socially deprived communities at particular risk.
It also means that wealthy areas of the country (such as Kensington which stands to be a net recipient upon the return of local business rates to the local level) will be able to afford a superior service paid for from taxation, whereas poor and particularly rural areas will be left with – if anything -second rate facilities that they have to fund themselves.
Fear of only two libraries in future
We are particularly concerned that if the Public Libraries and Museum’s Act is repealed, that here on the Isle of Wight there will be nothing to prevent Mr Pugh from returning to his original plan of closing all but two of the public libraries.
We note that it was only in the face of huge public opposition and the recourse to judicial review that led to the saving of six of eleven libraries, albeit with considerably reduced opening hours.
Sue Morgan (Secretary)
On behalf of Friends of Ventnor Library Committee
Interesting that of the three local government witnesses at this House of Commons Select Committee hearing only one Authority had immediately chosen closures over the others more imaginative thinking as a way of meeting budget cuts but not impairing their service levels.
Was Cllr. Pugh suggesting that community libraries have access to the IWC Library IT system for making reservations? Who pays for this IT access and for the library transport for moving stock around the branches?
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A very well worded letter, remarkable also for its self-restraint.
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Well done, Friends of Ventnor library. As a user of East Cowes library, I applaud your efforts to redress the lack of a balanced view put forward by our council leader. As someone who is fortunate enough to have a part time job, it is difficult to access my local library when it is only open 12 hours per week. Add to this the fact that the IW Council will no longer be leasing the building, causing it to move and you can see problems mounting. It may be nice in Shanklin with some 30 volunteers, but as I understand it, East Cowes had problems recruiting about a dozen.
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Thank you Ventnor, well put. The member of the committee who gave Cllr Pugh such a hard time (Paul Farrelly MP)will, I am sure be very interested in the contents of your letter, and will probably use it when the committee come to prepare their report. Never fear, you are by means the only ones fighting on!
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Well said Rupert Besley.
Cllr David Pugh is a smooth operator as he proved when he gave evidence to the The Sport, Media and Culture Committee’s inquiry. Clean cut, word perfect, cool and confident, who could doubt this was a young politician on top of his game, plausible and logical.
Unless, of course, you analysed what he had to say and it was apparent he was not only a master of local government jargon he had swallowed the manual and was regurgitating it.
A few years ago the Local Government Association (LGA) urged its members to use everyday words and phrases to improve communication. Jargon such as”predictors of beaconicity”,” taxonomy” and”re-baselining” should be abandoned said the LGA along with words such as seedbed (idea) slippage (delay) synergy (co-operation) and procure (buy).
Now I don’t recall if Cllr Pugh used any of these but as someone once said: “Why do we have to have ‘coterminous, stakeholder engagement’ when we could just ‘talk to people’ instead?”
Congratulations therefore to the Friends of Ventnor Library for producing a cogent letter I could follow and understand in one reading.
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Well done. A succinct and accurate summary that redresses the balance.
The only reason that community libraries have survived is that volunteer groups were effectively blackmailed into toeing the Council line by taking on the practical and financial responsibilities of the buildings as well as running the core business. Campaigners last year, including Friends of IW Libraries and the Bembridge Library Users Group, believed that volunteers, if required, should support paid professionals working on site and that fundraising should be focused on opening up new revenue streams for new services, rather than simply exist to pay the bills for property management.
As one of the volunteers at Bembridge, I will willingly continue to do my share in supporting the library. I am also very conscious that funding is the key issue and that the service runs on a knife edge. Although the organisers and volunteers are doing a very good job and that currently there many people willing to help,we are conscious that there are no professionals on site. If there were, the Council could claim that it was fulfilling its responsibilities under the 1964 act. It seems that David Pugh is hoping for a repeal of the Act in order that he can wreak more havoc on the service. If volunteers are unable to fulfil the council’s responsibilities, despite their best efforts, it must fall to the council to explain its dereliction of duty.
What has still to be acknowledged is that IWC singularly failed to carry out an effective impact statement and tried, without success, to get volunteer groups to carry these out on their behalf. When they did belatedly made an 11th-hour half hearted effort to introduce them it was poorly executed, not properly explained to library users, and contained inappropriate questions to which many people took offence. The results of this exercise have not, to my knowledge, been published.
Far from being an ‘innovative approach’ as summarised by David Pugh in his proposed presentation, the survival of the libraries was achieved thanks to the efforts of campaigners in spite of IWC’s original attempts to close 9 of the 11 libraries on the island. It is disingenuous and misleading for him to claim otherwise.
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D’arcy, if you have a copy of the form I am sure Dave Q would be very interested in getting his hands on it.
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Hi Concerned
Yes I do have copies. Happy to send DaveQ one if it’s helpful.
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Thank you
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D’arcy and Concerned, thank you indeed, a copy of that insulting document that wanted people to state their sexual orientation as if that had any bearibg on their use of the library, would be most useful in our continuing attempts at rattling Cllr Pugh’s cage! Sally and Simon have my email if you haven’t already got it!
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I should have made it clear in my letter that members of the public have no routine, on-the-spot access to professional staff in the community libraries in support of their reading; in fact the community libraries do currently have access to some support eg in the Summer Reading Challenge, BookTime, RhymeTime, and volunteer training.
The main point is that the Libraries and Museums Act establishes a requirement to provide a comprehensive and efficient library service. If that is repealed, it will leave each Local Authority to define its own level of service, however ineffective that may be for many people. The IoW CC’s original plan was to cut 9 out of 11 libraries and we knew we could challenge that under existing legislation. The concern is that the Select Committee’s reponse wil be, “Well let’s change the law “. We will not accept our Library service being wrecked.
Sue Morgan
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If there is any discrepancy, spin or contradiction in Pugh’s representations to the select committee, perhaps he should be asked to return for a further meeting to give an explanation, this time on his own?
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Misleading MPs is in a select committee is deemed to amount to a “contempt of the house” & carries some career threatening penalties. http://www.bevhillslawoffice.com/law-news/lying-to-a-select-committee-the-law
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Dream on you guys – Remember it was the Government who imposed the budget cuts on councils. Do you really believe they are going to take action on councils that have little other option but to reduce services.
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A select committee is made up from members of the 3 main parties and are not dictated to by government.
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Nobody should be surprised: did anyone seriously think the ghastly Pugh was going to represent anyone’s views but his own and those of his party?
Closing the libraries and pretending there are countless people just waiting for the opportunity to run them as unpaid volunteers suits them both perfectly. This would be bad enough if it only applied to the libraries, but unfortunately the policy also applies to schools, social service provision, the NHS etc etc, essentially anthing with the name ‘public’ before it. He and his friends cannot wait to privatise these and anything else available, so that they can quietly clean up at everyone else’s expense. I think those people were right who said at the time that, if she could, Thatcher would have bottled the air and sold it back to us, just as she did, for example, when robbing us of the railways, the coal and steel industry, huge gas and electricity investments, etc. etc. Time for change, I think!
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A change to whom? We had a Labour government for some 13 years and they changed exactly what??
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john says:
Today at 10:20 pm (7 minutes ago)
A change to whom? We had a Labour government for some 13 years and they changed exactly what??
END QUOTE:
I sort of love this myopic denial of reality.
The 17 years previous to 1997 was…..that’s right conservatives. Indeed since 1900 until 1997 (let’s call it a hundred years amongst friends eh..?) know how many years the Labour Party ruled during that period…?
Just to be generous including hung Parliaments..?
…20 years! Out of the last 100 we’ve had a Labour Government (until Blair in 1997, that is) for one fifth of them….20 years!
I reckon you need to dig a bit deeper to see how this country has been ruled and influenced over for the past few generations. Or maybe you conclude that the world all started in 1997..
Maybe like your statement there have been no social care cuts (I won’t ask you to substantiate that…. because you can’t) you live in a parallel universe to me…
JS
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poor John…another foot in mouth comment.
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Some would say that New labour was a conflict of the Blairites dis-owning all previous Labour party principles ie help for the underdog, equality for all etc and took the stance that the private sector will always out-perform the public sector, Trade Unions are a necessary evil but their money is useful and that America was a better partner – Bush included – than those ‘odd’ Europeans whilst the likes of Prescott were kept in the fold as camouflage to hide the shift to out-Tory the Conservatives. So yes much did change; principally the clearing-out of earlier principles whether they were good or bad.
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To be fair to John, New Labour were in power for 13 years and made little change. Although he fails to realise, New Labour became a Thatcherite type of government under Blair and introduced policies Thathcher would have been proud of.
Sadly her ideology has affected every government since she was PM and in my opinion, unless there is a radical change to a fairer and caring system, greed, wars, boom and bust will continue.
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Bottom line, we pay money for these services, the council are sitting in new offices that we have paid for, sitting pretty!! The Independants came up with an alternative to save all services but the council would not listen.
Pugh just needs to leave now and save the Island any more embarrassment. Impact assessment my arse, he seems to be talking constantly out of his!
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I thought the co-ordinated hand movements and postures Pugh cleverly used through his questioning was revealing. He reminded me of Blair, Cameron and many other politicians who use similar techniques when being interviewed or questioned.
Although David Pugh failed at university, and in my view has been a poor council leader, to be fair he’s come on a bundle in the Arts of spin, propaganda, and by improving his image using hands movements and body posture techniques.
I sometimes wonder whether Pugh and many other politicains learn these techniques by taking a course or from private image consultants.
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Have you noticed that he also seems to talk out of the side of his mouth at times? This and the hand movement would suggest to me that he’s out of his comfort zone most of the time?
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In my opinion, many politicians these days, (especially the younger types) care more about their careers, image and themselves than they do about the public and probably use image and speech consultants to help them succeed.
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He almost certainly has – and you paid for it through your council tax.
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The possible threat to repeal the Libraries and Museums Act is the real scary bit.
George Osborne is already threatening to get rid of loads of laws which protect us and the things we value, such as environmental legislation.
Just as George Osborne doesn’t get it that without a healthy environment we cannot have a healthy economy, so some politician don’t get it that without access to books, culture and information we cannot have a healthy democracy.
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