What Tory councillors believe

Some Tory councillors have said that they know libraries aren’t necessary, because book-borrowing rates are low. They believe that • 92% of Barnet residents have Internet access at home, • everyone can find everything they need on the Internet, and • people buy or download all the books they want from Amazon.

Do you believe that? More than 7% of Barnet residents are on benefits, and many others are financially hard-pressed, and some people – from middle-aged to elderly – might never have learned to use a computer. Do you think that people who have trouble making ends meet can afford not only computers but also the cost of broadband? That everything you want to know is free online? That everyone can afford to buy the books they want or need? I don’t, but maybe that’s because I talk and listen to people rather than reading statistics based on a survey of a very small number of residents. And this still misses the point that the library provides vital services that no computer can.

These same Tory councillors believe that even when some libraries are closed 95% of Barnet residents will be able to reach a public library within 30 minutes by public transport. They’ve done calculations, based on data from Transport for London, which represent ‘a complete journey from door to door’. They haven’t tried or tested it in reality. I live a 10-minute walk from my nearest bus stop. (It’s near what used to be my local library, until the council ran it down and then sold it despite huge opposition. It stayed empty for nearly 10 years and is now the site of what will be luxury flats. Get the picture?) If I reach the bus stop just after a bus has departed, I might wait another 10–12 minutes for the next one. And I’ll have to change buses to get to my nearest library. Thirty minutes? No way. How about you? And they don’t mention the return journey.

Barnet Tory councillors claim that it will be safe to leave libraries open for hours with no staff present: people will have to have a library card and PIN (available to any resident) to enter and there will be CCTV. Oh good: there will be a record of the masked individuals who steal the computers, books, CDs, DVDs or furniture, or intimidate other users, or vandalise the premises. It might work somewhere in Sweden but no one I’ve met at the consultations or spoken to elsewhere thinks these so-called security measures will keep libraries secure in Barnet.

These Tory councillors are, quite simply, out of touch with the lives of many of their constituents. They have forgotten that their job is to represent all of them, not just the better off ones like themselves. It’s time to remind them.

If you care about retaining a quality library service, please write to your councillors, tell them how much you value the libraries and want them to be retained, with trained librarians to staff them. If improvements are needed, let’s make them to the council-run services rather than cut them down to a useless size. With the election coming in May, write to your MP too, asking him or her to promise to maintain our council-run library service: no closures, so shrinking, no privatising.

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