Will we have to take to the streets again to save libraries from axe?

Published: 14 October, 2010

• COMMUNITY activists in Highgate are gearing up to battle Camden Council as impending cuts to public services threaten libraries.

Labour councillor Valerie Leach has warned that there is a very real risk to Highgate Library. Enid Evans, committee member of the Friends of Highgate Library, told me: “These are hard times for public services and libraries are seen as a soft target when cuts are implemented by the council.

“It could be closure, or the cutting of opening hours and staffing levels. The risk is borough-wide and the individual library campaign groups will fight the cuts together.”

Camden has 13 public libraries and a table of performance figures released by Camden Council puts Highgate near the bottom.

Ms Evans says: “The bean counters measure what they can measure, but a library is worth so much more. It is a focal point. It is a place where local people can mix.

“We have free computer lessons for pensioners, invited speakers, music and we hold public meetings. You can’t move for mothers, children and pushchairs when the local school shuts.

If the library closes then it’s the old and the young that will suffer the most.”

Camden’s libraries were under threat at the end of the 1990s and three were earmarked for closure by the Labour-controlled council.

Ms Evan recalls: “Some of Camden’s Labour councillors rebelled and helped to overturn the decision.

“It was an amazing time. The steps of the Town Hall were full of people demonstrating.

The council had to back down in the end.”

MIKE DOHERTY
Address supplied