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September 13, 2006
Andrew Stevens cannot see a problem
Here is Andrew Steven's response to Susan Hill's view expressed in the Guardian yesterday.
Andrew Stevens doesn't say that his office have not been able to produce any figures for public libraries for more than 18 months. He appears not to have noticed the 100 or so library closures this year. Accounts from councils all over the country (readers of this blog see them all the time) say that because book collections are poor, opening hours are short and buildings have been neglected, people are deserting the public library service in droves. Mr Stevens doesn't report that book lending in public libraries in almost every part of the country has fallen by 25-30% in just those same five years since he introduced "library standards"
Mr Stevens has failed to publish the report on public library buildings that Parliament asked him for over a year ago and for which we, the people, paid last year.
According to Mr Stevens there is no problem. The actions he and his colleagues are taking, he believes, are quite sufficient and, presumably, the predictions made by the Audit Commission, the Select Committee and the Library and Information statistics unit that the library service will be finished in 10-15 years, are simply wrong.
What he should say is "Book collections have become poor and we will help councils address this matter as a priority". That's what Mark Wood, his boss, said on here, on Sunday. There is a fault line as wide as the Grand Canyon between the Chairman of the MLA and the management.
The biggest reason why we never solve the problem of the public library service is that Andrew, and his colleagues Chris Batt and John Dolan, and the Minister, David Lammy and his office, simply cannot bring themselves to describe any kind of problem with the service.
They are so relentlessly determined to tell everyone that everything is fine and lots of very useful initiatives are in progress, that no one ever gets to the root of any of the serious questions. you cannot go to a council and ask them to address the questions, because they simply point to the latest memorandum from MLA and DCMS which tells them that the official view is that there are no questions to answer.
It is so reminiscent of the story of the Emperor's new clothes in which the closest advisers were so determined to tell their master that everything is wonderful that they completely missed the obvious.
The truth is that the Minister, Mr Lammy, should see through all the bluff, but I see no sign of that happening.
Posted by Tim Coates at September 13, 2006 10:42 AM