The provision of libraries across Yorkshire is often a polarising debate - Carl Les
An interesting letter in The Yorkshire Post on Saturday caught my eye. I won`t go into the details as the letter writer is asking for a response from others, but it concerns the recent local elections. Specifically the new political priorities that will be introduced following a change in leadership, and in particular the abandonment of priorities that previous administrations had supported in the past, and were likely to continue.
As ever with political change caused by an election, not every policy is detailed in a manifesto, even the major parties at a general election can only headline the big ones, then have a light touch on most they want to do. And at a local level incoming administrations soon realise that they have to come to terms with what resources are available, the art of the possible, and then decide on what is considered an acceptable expense.
Elsewhere in the news the new administration of a North East council wants to revert a road to a former dual carriageway. This will improve traffic flows in their opinion.
This will require reinstating one carriageway to all traffic but to enable that to happen they will have to rip out a newly-laid smooth footpath, a well-demarked two-way cycleway and significant landscaping and planting introduced to divide the different roles. They may find that reinstatement will cost as much, if not more, than the original change which was likely paid for by a government grant to encourage ‘active travel’.
No doubt the reversal will have to be paid for by the local taxpayer alone. That said they will claim they have a political mandate to do so, as their party was elected, although their opponents will no doubt ask where such expense was spelt out.
This other debate centres around the provision of libraries, often a polarising debate supported by those who use them and therefore value them, (the outgoing administration) and those who don’t, and therefore care less for them, (the incoming).
I appreciate that is a very simplistic characterisation of the argument about library provision, but the days of the Scots-born philanthropist Andrew Carnegie are long gone. He believed that everybody should have an opportunity to better their education so set about using his fabulous wealth gained from his steel empire in the United States, providing a reading library in every major town.
We have one in North Yorkshire – in Harrogate – but I`m told for some reason only half the money was given, so the building, though still welcome, is only half the size and shape. It is still one of my favourite buildings in the county, although these days most of my learning and reading is done on a computer screen.
The question will be who pays, and how much, and then for how long. It is not a statutory service, that is not something a council has to do, so it is discretionary, only done if a council wants to do it. We faced a similar cliff-edge decision in North Yorkshire a decade or so ago.
Our approach was not universally popular at the time, but it was to invite our communities, or at least those parts of the communities who valued the service, to take on the running of the library service in partnership with us.
After some very useful dialogue about the detail, and repositioning on our part, it became clear that there was an appetite for this to maintain the service, but in a phrase I use often enough now in such negotiations, ‘it has to be delegation not abdication’. We still have a role to play and a commitment to fulfil. I hope our library partners will agree we play our part.
Part of this commitment to the value of libraries will be seen in the next few months. We intend to upgrade the public access computers in all our libraries during the summer months. This will be at our main sites and those run by volunteers. Essential updates to IT are always necessary but also costly, and we will not abdicate our responsibilities on this.
The new equipment will be the latest technology, and will include larger monitors and wi-fi will be enhanced. To improve accessibility, ergonomic keyboards and mice will be available at workstations or on demand. This is now not a luxury, but a norm.
More and more people bring their own devices to use so we are reconfiguring spaces to suit this trend. We may have to reduce the number of fixed computers at some sites but we will retain enough to meet known user demand.
Some sites are also having their wi-fi access points updated at the same time. We will keep our users well-informed about changes as they are being introduced, and keep any disruption to a minimum.
The old equipment we are removing will be re-used in other non-public settings where possible, or it will be recycled for others to use, but this is not without significant cost as the kit has to be electronically cleaned.
Coun Carl Les is the Leader of North Yorkshire Council.