The DCMS & Civil Society (and Ed!)

Recently an announcement was made by the government that could have a fundamental effect on the future of public libraries in the UK, responsibility for the government's 'Civil Society' (Charities, SocEnts, Mutuals etc) agenda has shifted from the Cabinet Office to the DCMS. The Minister involved is Rob Wilson who has also been given the DCMS libraries brief. This change takes place shortly after a ministerial re-shuffle that saw John Whittingdale being replaced by Karen Bradley and Ed Vaizey by Matt Hancock.
This move is seen by many as an attempt by the government to re-position and re-invigorate (or even demote) their 'Big Society' agenda;

"Under cover of darkness the Office for Civil Society, a shadow of its former self, slips, almost unnoticed, out of the Cabinet Office, shuffles across Whitehall and finds refuge in the cavernous DCMS."
http://www.civilsociety.co.uk/governance/blogs/content/22119/the_rise_and_fall_of_the_office_for_civil_society 

But why might all this be bad news for public libraries? Well although we've only got a handful of library mutuals we've definitely seen a push towards offloading library services to Social Enterprises, Charitable Trusts etc and with the Minister for Civil Society now holding the libraries brief within the DCMS I would be very surprised if their wasn't an escalation. Add to this the fact that the new 'Libraries Minister', Matt Hancock, is a Suffolk MP and that Suffolk Libraries are an Independent & Provident Society (IPS) then you can start to see why I'm getting twitchy.

And as for Ed Vaizey, his tenure as the longest serving 'Libraries Minister' was a complete and utter disaster for public library services, users and staff. During his reign we lost 8000 paid/trained library staff, 343-600+ libraries (figure depends on whether you count volunteer-led 'libraries' as closed); saw a 93% increase in volunteers, a huge decrease in budgets/opening hours and an escalation in privatisation/commercialisation. He also treated campaigners with contempt, blocking them on twitter and breaking his promise to debate with them in a public meeting.
Although he was very vocal about library cuts/closures in opposition he refused to intervene or speak out when in power, a total dereliction of his duties and leadership remit under the 1964 Act.

Advocacy under austerity, Vaizey, Northamptonshire and donations and cynical electioneering.

Advocacy under austerity

A rather excellent piece by Pedronicus on advocacy and austerity in response to a recent CILIP blog;

https://pedronicusuk.wordpress.com/2015/03/05/libraries-advocacy-and-austerity/

"In the present climate, where services are immediately and imminently under threat of extinction, in those instances I do not see any alternative other than what has been termed “protest advocacy”. There is not time to think in terms of “changing the narrative”, or “building relationships”. Libraries do not need more or even better advocacy: they need actual money to be available in local authority budgets which have been cut to impossibly low levels. They need to be nurtured and sustained at the level of national and local policy by people who are not driven by neoliberal ideology. On the level of our whole society, it needs ALL of us to reflect long and hard on whether we want to continue to allow our lives and those of our communities to be directed by values that see no worth in anything other than its monetary value or ability to generate income.

If we do that maybe we can collectively start to find some real answers."

and another very splendid piece by Ian Clark on the very same topic;
http://infoism.co.uk/2015/03/better-advocacy/

 

Vaizey, Northamptonshire and donations

 

The man who would rather not intervene, Ed Vaizey, visited a library in Northamptonshire recently. "Big deal" I here you say, well Northamptonshire is Paul Blantern (CEO of the county council and Chair of the Sieghart Taskforce) territory. Ed had some interesting things to say during his visit, things that outline the governments policy on libraries; donations, volunteers, philanthropy, hubs and private/public models.

 

http://www.northampton-news-hp.co.uk/Thriving-Northampton-library-praised-culture/story-26124894-detail/story.html

"The visit comes weeks after the county council unveiled a new public donation scheme aimed enhancing library services.
The scheme however sparked fears that libraries in the county are under threat of closing down, something which was quickly denied by the local authority, who said it was just 'an example of the constant work in the county to make sure libraries are hubs at the very heart of our communities'.
When the Northants H&P asked Mr Vaizey for his thoughts on the scheme he said: "Libraries actually originally came into fruition mainly through generous donations.
"Andrew Carnegie is the most famous person who is responsible for hundreds of libraries in the UK, and back them libraries didn't become a statutory so they didn't start being paid for by the rate payer till about 100 years ago.
"We have a private public model for a lot of things such as local arts organisations, which gets government grants to cover the basics but they also raise money from people who support those organisations."

Cynical Electioneering

Oh you know how the government has cut local council grants by 30-50% and has refused to re-introduce the abolished English library standards and has abolished the Advisory Council for Libraries and has handed the development remit for libraries to an arts organisation and them cut it's funding and hasn't bothered to replace (as far as we know?) Yinnon Ezra (DCMS Specialist Advisor for Libraries) and sat on the Sieghart Report until one day before the xmas recess and has allowed Ed Vaizey to do bugger all about superintending the 64 Act and how 6000 library staff have lost their jobs since 2007/8 and how several hundred libraries have been closed or are at risk of closure and how 12% of all public libraries are now volunteer-led, WELLLL now they've decided that they want to promote library membership for children, is there an election coming up?
http://www.thebookseller.com/news/government-promotes-child-library-membership

 

Ed pops up!

Just when we were thinking (or hoping) that Ed had washed his hands off libraries he pops up all over the place, first in Corby, visits a couple of libraries, with Cllrs Savage (very apt!) and Harker in tow and then declares that;

“The library service in Northamptonshire has been designed with a clear focus on the needs of their communities, with Sunday opening and innovative use of volunteers helping to ensure that all their libraries remain open and provide wide range of support and services for the community,” Mr Vaizey said. “It’s an example from which others can learn. I know they are active in collaborating with other public library authorities and I want to see this continue and grow in the future.”

 

Northamptonshire CC calls its service ‘Library Plus’, operates within it a number of ‘Enterprise Hubs’ and relies heavily on volunteers to run the whole shebang. Just the kind of entrepreneurial, shared services, collocated and ‘Localism’ style service that Ed and the DCMS are striving towards, so it was really lucky that he just happened to be in the area!

 

But what Ed, the press and the councillors didn’t mention was the unscheduled closures, redundancies, budget cuts, thefall in visitor figures and the use of volunteers not only to prop the service up but also to substitute paid staff. Concernshave also been raised about collocating ‘children’s centres’ with libraries;

 

“expressed concerns that "libraries aren't the right environment for young family activities (including safeguarding concerns relating to full public access and confidentiality issues)", and some raised worries about accessibility and location.”

John Wignall has very kindly allowed me to publish his comment about Ed’s visit;

“I find the report on Ed Vaizey’s visit to Northants depressing and distressing. It is not at all in tune with what I hear from former colleagues who have nearly all lost their jobs. The report from 2013 presents a truer picture of the situation”

Ed then, just to show that he really cares about libraries, pops up on National Libraries Day in Kent, at Deal Library. Kent is becoming a ‘commissioning council’, a local authority that doesn’t run its own services, including libraries, but outsources them to private firms and other providers. So just the kind of privatising model that the government likes, Ed really is good at picking his library visits isn’t he?

The State of London's Libraries

Today i met with fellow London Libraries Unison Stewards, who are doing a brilliant job trying to defend their members and the service, to discuss the current state of affairs and although i can't go into detail about what was discussed what I can say is that we are in deep deep shit!

The service in the capital is being hollowed out and ripped apart so if ACE try to cloud your vision with talk of £6m arts partnerships, or the SCL's 'universal offers' give you optimism, or god forbid you are taken in by Vaizey's rosy eyed view then tell them from me it is far too little far too late and if they deny this then they are talking complete and utter nonsense .

And yes i do have an alternative plan; strike, protest and occupy.

Vaizey's Speech to the 'Future of Library Services' Conference

Today Ed Vaizey gave a speech at the 'Future of Library Services' conference hosted by Neil Stewart Associates, "the leading specialists in public policy communications". The co-sponsor was John Laing Ltd, who run Hounslow Libraries, and the supporters were the SCL, the CLOA and the Reading Agency.

Let me start by talking about some good news, the DCMS and the DfE are to work together to provide automatic library membership to every primary school child, an idea put forward by Michael Rosen.

In the rest of his speech Vaizey paints a very rosy picture of the state of library services in England
"I’m delighted to have the opportunity to speak at today’s conference. This is a great opportunity to talk about the thriving library service that we have in England."

He then picks Canada Water Library, Fitton Hill Library and Neighbourhood Centre, The Hive in Worcestershire and the £200m new Birmingham Library to illustrate his point! Hardly representative of the service!
Then he makes a blunder, he states that according to the latest data from the 'Taking Part' survey library visits are not in decline but according to the latest quarterly figures they've dropped from 39.7% to 38.8%!
He then goes on to announce that ACE will be allocating £6m pounds to develop partnerships between libraries and the arts;

"Today I am delighted to announce that the Arts Council will be allocating £6 million from its Grants for the Arts programme over the next two years for library authorities to lead projects working with artists, arts organisations and other cultural organisations on arts and cultural activity through libraries.
This fund will aim to stimulate ambitious, innovative partnerships between libraries and artists and arts organisations. It will help raise the ambition and expectation of libraries, and represents a significant commitment by the Arts Council to their new role."

Yes £6m seems a lot of money but shared out amongst all the libraries in England it is but a drop in the ocean and the over emphasis on the arts is worrying, no mention of education, knowledge, information or lifelong learning, surely the key core role of Public Libraries!

He then states he will be setting up with CIPFA a new benchmarking system for local authority services, called ‘comparative profile reports’ he also states that he will be commissioning reports on all the library authorities in England which will be available for public view from Dec2012. Are these the new 'Library Standards' that we have all been asking for?

"My Department will use the reports to look for ways in which we can help local authorities.  I must emphasise that this is not an attempt to sanction local authorities and certainly not a return to top-down, inflexible library standards. But if we see wildly diverging opening hours between two similar authorities with similar budgets and infrastructure, there will be an opportunity to ask questions and look at how opening hours could be improved.
Or if one authority is spending twice as much on book stock as another, but providing a similar number of books, we can ask if there are ways to improve efficiency in the authority in question."

He tackles the issue of using volunteers in libraries by stating;

"Volunteers are crucial to the library service.  But let me state again, as I have so often, they are not a substitute for expertise of professional librarians, as well as other people trained in specific aspects of the library service."

And then in my view contradicts himself by stating;

"I am also pleased to see community supported libraries coming into play, particularly where a local authority is planning to close a building. Community run libraries are contributing to a diverse picture of libraries located within village halls, pubs, shops, churches, day care centres, tourist information centres and enterprise hubs.
Community managed and community supported libraries will never replace the extensive network of council run libraries we enjoy.  But they do provide an important additional element of provision, and an important alternative model which can add to the rich variety of services already available."

Community Libraries and the volunteers who run them take jobs away from paid library staff, so it is substitution!

He then congratulates ACE for its 'Envisioning the library of the future' initiative, mentions the new LGA report ‘Local Solutions for Future Local Library Services’ and finishes with the immortal;

"I have made it clear from the moment I became a Minister that no library authority should contemplate closing libraries unless they have conducted a proper review of their library service.
While some local authorities have put forward controversial proposals since 2010, all of them have conducted a library review, as I made clear to them they would have to do when I took office. I have no doubt that the efforts of library campaigners have also brought about welcome changes in some of the more extreme proposals put forward. 
Nevertheless, I am always mindful that libraries are a local service, paid for by local taxpayers.  As far as possible, local democracy not Whitehall diktat should have an impact on how they are shaped. A library inquiry is a power of last resort – it has only ever been used once in fifty years. It is not a tool to be used lightly, or for political expediency"

The Minister who has done nothing has the temerity to praise campaigners for trying to halt the destruction and divestment of the Public Library service that he by his own inaction has renounced responsibility for! If it wasn't so tragic it would be funny!

"I hope you will join me in continuing to spread the good news" Thank you Ed we will if we can find any!