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May 31, 2008
The Conway Report-- moaning to the end of time
The report published by CILIP and written by Patrick Conway, once head of libraries in County Durham, and an editorial committee of Martin Molloy, Jane Hall and Tony Durcan is going the rounds at present; it is called "Professional Standards of service"
I have read it three times because I have in the past been very critical of the public library activities of CILIP, which is the professional body of librarians.
The heart of the report is a set of ten narrative descriptions of individual public library authorities written in the difficult-to-understand language of local government speak. When matters are believed to be good they are praised to the skys; when matters do not conform to the author's view they are still praised but with a degree of barbed innuendo. In this style the conclusion for the library service in Dudley says:
" Current senior management in the Adult, Community and Housing Services Directorate have expressed ambition for the Library Service and suggest it now has a raised profile and is of strategic importance.
Time will tell, for its potential role in the Council’s overall access to services strategy linked to community development does not seem to have been fully recognised."
Quite what this means - or what anyone is supposed to do as a result of it having been written- is a mystery to this reader and probably would be to any member of the public.
Mr Conway and his colleagues fall headlong into the age old pot hole cave of the library service: they acknowledge that the library profession have a duty to the public and then make absolutely no attempt to find out, understand, listen to or analyse what the public want and need from the library service for which it pays. They end up assessing library performance not through the eyes of ordinary people but from their own very particular standpoint.
Mr Conway's standpoint - in common with that of the rest of the old brigade at CILIP- Molloy, Durcan, McKee and the rest-- is that library professionals know best what the library service should do - even though they find it very difficult to explain what that is. People should listen to them more, pay them more, respect them more, give their members more jobs, and appoint them to higher positions in councils. In their view aspects of the library service that are deemed to be successful are a result of their foresight and wisdom. Aspects of the service which account for its decline in use and reputation are the fault of everybody else from successive Ministers, Civil Servants, Councillors and dimwits and philistines in local government-- if not the entire middle class of the country.
"For several years there has been a regular refrain bemoaning the position of chief librarians in local authority structures. Heads of service may be engaged in second/third level officer discussions on broader corporate matters, eg access to local authority services, but the opportunity to contribute at a strategic policy level is more restricted."
Translated into English this means "As a professional body we have been moaning on for a long time, but councils still don't think we have anything useful to say- it's not fair"
It is hard to say good things about the management of local government- but by and large, in my experience, if they spot some management talent they use it. If library staff showed ability to think and get things done, that will be noticed and encouraged. The problem that I have seen is that management talent rarely emerges from the library professionals-- and that is the reason they are not at the highest tables, not because of some misguided prejudice. Unfortunately Mr Conway and his friends can't see that, because they choose not to wish to.
Here is the conclusion about Hampshire
"Management has been vigorous in progressing its agenda for re branding libraries and prioritising marketing and customer care. It suggests professional service standards, relating to complex and detailed enquiry work, the care and management of special collections and the development of reading, learning and creative programmes will not suffer.
At this stage those arguments are compelling, but the full impact of a loss of professional capacity to develop further services in response to changing personal, community and societal needs remains open to question. While senior management has a clear vision, opportunities to deliver that vision and maintain a flexible and innovative outlook locally, could be adversely
compromised in the future by the reduction in professional staff".
Readers of this blog will know that the people of the county of Hampshire have expressed their profound anxiety about the 'vision' of Hampshire county council.. Roughly paraphrased what the existing readers say is that in pursuit of a new audience for libraries the county council have lost the essence of what a public library is and spent far too much public money in pursuit of their ambition. The people of the county place particular emphasis on the removal of books from the libraries and the lowering of the quality of the stock. In response the library authority have pleaded the need to change and time to show what they can do. (This blog is not impartial in this matter- but does understand that the county council holds a genuine view and implements it with conviction- we just disagree with their view and campaign about it!)
The public view of this aspect of the county's work is not mentioned in Patrick Conway's analysis. He only talks about the outcry at the redundancy of professional librarians when the revenue budget for the service needed to be brought in to line with what people could afford. Mr Conway is selective about which views the public express merit his support. If you claim to work for the public interest you can't do that. This omission gives his game away.
In a disorganised and inarticulate way, the document rambles on without clarity, purpose, evident conclusion or recognisably useful recommendation. Even a summary would have helped the writer to think what he was trying to say.
-------------
The report is a terrible disappointment.
- It is unclear what value 'the library profession' brings or should bring to the library service. It does not show a lead or make an articulate statement about CILIP should do. After all these years , it is about time CILIP was clear about what it intends to do. The time for debates is long past
- It shows no comprehension of the public need for or wishes for the library service nor any understanding of how to assemble that information
- It is entirely another intra governmental document which is written in language the nuances of which exclude the public from participating in the discussion
- It is in essence one long moan from beginning to end by put upon worn out jobsworths, treading on the toes of some local authorities who are probably doing their best. The response from Hillingdon is the one that everyone else should have given-- they refused to be bothered.
The first recommendation the report makes is that the report should be shown to The Minister. Goodness only knows why. If her advisers can't see what a waste of time it would be for her to read it, I hope she tells them to sort themselves out and stop whingeing. Senior members of CILIP have been in a stronger position to do something about the public library service than anyone in the country. In the past decade, while I have watched, they have failed utterly and miserably. They deserve no more of anyone's time -away with them
What is needed is a new brigade of bright imaginative public librarians who will commit themselves with urgency and vigour to providing the public with the service they want and deserve. Those who could achieve ambition with energy and intelligence would find themselves elevated to the top tables of councils and national bodies by virtue of genuine persuasion and by what they do, not because they belong to some ancient self important body.
What is not needed is any more weary misery from the incumbent pensioners of the profession. They have had their time-- put them out to graze. They are Syrup Spongers.
Posted by Perkins at 9:21 AM | Comments (6)
May 29, 2008
SYRUP stirred
The postman has kindly delivered a report from CILIP. CILIP, the professional body of librarians in this country has often been the subject of derision for its public library activity, on this site, but this time Perkins has decided to read the report carefully three times before she says anything.
Posted by Perkins at 7:58 AM | Comments (0)
May 23, 2008
Conservative Progress
The Bookseller carries this important article
(Thank goodness for The Bookseller-- without them public libraries would be in a real whiskas)
Posted by Perkins at 1:57 PM | Comments (3)
May 17, 2008
Perkins puts her paw on it:
The fundamental problem of the MLA and its new action plan lies in the very first line which says
"This Action Plan reflects the outcome of extensive consultation and engagement with stakeholders".
Mr Clare has failed to understand, again, that the stakeholders of the public library service are the public. They pay. His document does not, as Framework for the Future never did, attempt to articulate what the public might need their libraries for and how they would like to see them improved. Instead, by stakeholders, he means cronies in other government quangoes and departments and the so-called 'professional' bodies.. normally referred to as 'the usual suspects' - Miss Bo Peep at the Knitting Agency, SYRUP, SCL and all the rest of them.
Because of this omission this Action Plan has become, yet again, a discussion between government departments and quangoes about the conventions of English Government, viz what one department ought politely to be able to say to another without upsetting them. It does nothing to correct the obvious and now enormous problems of an average public library.
So when the paper starts off with a list of what it calls 'What a good library looks like' instead of sentences that Mrs Jo Bloggs would understand like 'It's open, it's got what you need.. etc' the MLA action plan says
"The best libraries are well led, entrepreneurial, efficiently managed and proactive advocates of best practice.' ---- Excuse me?
If you had asked Mrs Bloggs what makes a good fish and chip shop I don't think she would have said "It's entrepeneurial, effficiently managed, etc.." she probably would have talked about the fish and the chips.
I have had to write to The Bookseller to point this out.
They could always have asked Perkins what she thought -- but they didn't do that either!
Posted by Perkins at 9:54 AM | Comments (3)
May 15, 2008
Karen Cunningham
About a year ago Karen Cunningham, who is the head of public libraries in Glasgow, made an important speech in which she said that she intended to reverse the decline in emphasis on books in her libraries. At that point the published figures showed that book lending in Glasgow was among the lowest in the whole UK at less than 4 loans per person in the city per year. (Good libraries achieve 10 loans or more).
This week at the Booksellers Association conference Karen has repeated her very important message, as reported in the Bookseller --
"Cunningham also spoke about the connection between the current strong performance of Glasgow's library service, and its renewed focus on book reading. She said that Glasgow "took its eye off the ball" in earlier years when it invested heavily in ICT (information communications technology) and "threw out our core business—reading". She said: "If we had put the same amount of planning, time and resources into reading we would not have seen the dramatic decline in issues and membership that libraries have seen over the last 10 years." In Glasgow, that decline had been reversed in terms of children's issues, while adults' had "bottomed out," she added."
Good stuff. Among the many important points she is making is that unless a council admits that it has been making a mistake, within the political mechanisms that operate, it is impossible to correct it. We have to admit that the policy on book acqusitions has been seriously wrong in order to persusade politicians to help us put it right.
Posted by Perkins at 9:56 AM | Comments (1)
May 14, 2008
Remove public libraries from the control of national and local government
The Booksellers (and Publishers) association met in Brighton this week. This is from the report in Publishing News
Charkin’s plea
AT THE SESSION on library partnerships, Bloomsbury's Richard Charkin spoke passionately from the floor about the "absurd politicking of public libraries" in recent years.
"It costs £700,000 a year to run some public libraries where only £3-4,000 is spent on books," he said. "Even if it was double that, it's an absurdly low amount. Libraries are the best placed to reach the widest range of communities. Let's kick the politicians into touch on this issue
There are other ways of running a body of this kind-- the BBC is an example. I think that is a good idea worth exploring.
Posted by Perkins at 10:26 AM | Comments (2)
May 9, 2008
The MLA
There can hardly be sadder stories more illustrative of the waste of opportunity of the last ten years of government than that of the MLA.
We hear that the library staff of the MLA are all about to leave, which is news at the hearing of which the public should not weep. The record of grim uselesness, waste of money, failed and unthought out initiatives, horrible arrogance, deceit and incomprehensible mutilation of language and grammar has been exhausting.
The organisation now also has no chairman, no purpose, no sense of direction and is doing nothing. Its Ministers and their civil servants appear to have abandoned it with embarrassment and that shines no virtuous light upon them either. The whole lot of them should all go and roll in wet and dirty mud- and then stand and apologise to the public whom they have so let down.
Posted by Perkins at 2:09 PM | Comments (0)
The Conservative Party
The Tories had a meeting yesterday to talk about public library policy. Let's hope that there is some useful and sensible outcome.
In a democracy we do depend on politicians to take a lead and to take sensible action. Politics is not just about getting elected.
The Tories, of course, are already responsible for the majority of public libraries in England because of the number of local councils they control..
Let us hope....
Posted by Perkins at 2:02 PM | Comments (0)
May 7, 2008
Sleep walking to disaster
'Sleep walking' was the expression used in a Demos report a few years ago to describe the state of the public library service.
Amanda Field makes the point that seems to be eluding all those (many) public librarians who are currently in debate about how to provide TV programmes for library users.
'Words fail me in regard to plans to show TV programmes at a Nottingham library. Perhaps you could also install a bar and re-name it Wetherspoons? This is a noisy world with very few places to go for quiet reading and study: a library used to be one of these places. Now they are filled with the sounds of people in the cafe, mobile phone ringtones, talking staff....even talking lifts, all of which (if Gosport is anything to go by) permeate every corner of the building because silence has been deemed to be politically incorrect.
I suppose the rationale for TV is that no-one goes into a library to read any more, because of the noise levels and because the book-stock is usually so dire.....so why not 'attract' some non-readers by having televisions (thus emitting even more noise). In what way, exactly, does MTV have any connection with literacy and reading......which is surely the sole reason for libraries' existence?'
The questions that both Amanda and I would ask are 'Why are you spending your time worrying about providing television programmes? and 'Who has decided that this is right thing to do? and 'Who is in Charge?"
Posted by Perkins at 11:24 AM | Comments (0)
May 6, 2008
Televisions in Nottingham libraries
Not comprehensive attention to the book collections-- but state of the art screenery in Nottingham
'We are planning to put plasma screens in a library that is being refurbished. We want to put 4 screens in the library and to be to able to show freeview television and PowerPoint displays/adverts on each one. We also want to be able to show different freeview channels on different screens at the same time i.e. cbeebies in the children's library, mtv in the teenage section and news 24 in the adult library.
We have seen systems that allow you to show rolling PowerPoint sequences but does anybody operate a multi channel service that combines freeview and powerpoint and allows the flexibility we require (I've had details regarding Swansea's service). Any information about service providers, how it operates, rough costings etc. would help.
I will post a summary of the responses
Steve Baker
Peoples Network Development Officer
Libraries, Archives and Information
Communities
Nottinghamshire County Council
01777 706973 Direct Line
01777 708813 Retford Library Admin Line
07870 213009 Mobile
steve.baker@nottscc.gov.uk
Our vision is to make Nottinghamshire a better place.
Find out how Nottinghamshire County Council employees are making a difference at www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/youmakethedifference"
Posted by Perkins at 6:34 PM | Comments (5)
May 4, 2008
Too many conferences, not enough work
5 years ago in a letter to The Bookseller I listed the waste of public money that goes on in the public library service. One of the items was the number of conferences and committee meetings attended by managers that take them away from their job. You would think it was trivial to say such things- except that it is true. Officers in the public library sections of local government have long paid holidays, they do take a lot of time off work for other reasons and in addition they do attend, at public expense, an awful lot of conferences. It means that their time spent actually opening libraries for the public to visit, which is what we pay them for, is probably only half the year.
This morning another one pops up ungrammatically on the radar:
"**Apologies for cross-posting**
Learning Our Future Today - Joint BMLG and PLG Conference
13-15 June 2008, Wyboston Lakes, Bedfordshire
A forward look for librarianship and libraries.
The theme of the conference is to stand back today and project into the future - the future for public libraries, the future for librarians and for all those who work in public libraries.
The conference will have much to offer anyone working in public libraries at every level. The programme includes the speakers - Roy Clare, Chief Executive, MLA, Tom Forrest who is well known to many librarians for his work on leadership and James Dearnley from Loughborough University.
If you haven't already booked a place make sure you do it now! It really will be a weekend well spent - for more information go to: www.cilip.org.uk/plg2008
Posted by Angie Weatherhead PLG website co-ordinator"
I don't know what BMLG stands for but PLG stands for the public library group of CILIP, the Chartered Institute of Library Information Professionals.
Roy Clare spoke to librarians three weeks ago at the Library and Information Show, in March at the meeting of the Society of Chief Librarians, last November at the Talis conference, last September at the Librarians' annual conference, and will doubtless be talking to them again if and when the MLA decides what its latest action plan is likely to be. Running public libraries is not a democratic forum- it is a management job that requires clear pupose and effective communication.
The MLA is a long overrun joke that cannot even do the one job with which it was tasked which is to close itself down. Previously it failed to move to Birmingham, which is what Tony Blair asked it to do. It is a year since Roy Clare was appointed and he has done nothing so far. As for CILIP...well - honestly who would pay a membership fee for CILIP?
(Perkins has not been invited to the jolly in Bedfordshire)
Posted by Perkins at 9:51 AM | Comments (3)
May 3, 2008
The MLA are ambitious
Here in a Saturday morning press release from the MLA
'Our ambition is that our sector’s engagement with the Cultural Olympiad through Setting the Pace will lead to a transformation in the way people experience the inspiration, learning and creativity museum, library and archive collections generate. Increasing participation by non-traditional audiences – particularly young people, black and minority ethnic communities and people with disabilities – is a core target for this programme.'
When you compare that with the shear common sense of the entry below that I have called "A clear focus" -- you see how unbelievably stupid and arrogant the people at the MLA are.
Posted by Perkins at 3:44 PM | Comments (0)
Elections make no difference
Somewhere in the local government election results we should find the clue to the way that the public library service will improve. We entrust our local politicians with the service. We say frequently that ministers do not have the sway or power to effect change in local councils.
But there is nothing in the elections of this week that can bring change. The public library service is not operated under the management of local councillors, it is driven by a shared view of local government officers and senior librarians. They decide the drift and the priorities. They decide whether the focus is on books or not on books, they set the balance of expenditure between overhead and public service.
They are not accountable to any effective management or body. They are not under any control in the name of the people or even local communities. They have no leaders who will explain what they do or intend to do.
It doesn't have to be like that-- and it is not in a healthy state because of it-- but it is. For all the ten years I have watched the service operate they have effectively ignored or sidelined any political attempt at improvement, whether it be of purpose or of efficiency. The service takes money from the public without making a case for its need.
Who will tell the library service what to do? Who will speak for the public? Who will make these 'officers of the state' listen?
Posted by Perkins at 10:56 AM | Comments (0)
May 2, 2008
A clear focus
From James Christie:
I'm probably going to get lynched by a rampaging mob of library bloggers for saying this, but Roy Clare may have the right idea. I came out two years ago and said that libraries should be about books and reading. Not that IT should be thrown out completely, but that books and reading were our core values and let's stop hemming and hawing about it. Roy Clare says "the future for libraries lies in integrating with local services around reading and books" and he intends to "brave controversy". Well, please do so, Roy. PLEASE. Cut out the big words, get back to basics and give us good well-stocked libraries.
On a personal note, though, I'm sick to death of hearing about databases, cross-connected or otherwise. Time and again, IT projects driven by people obsessed with the "white heat" of technology waste time and money which would be better spent elsewhere. Trim down those conservatives, Roy, read my blog "The Gordian Knot", make some unpopular decisions and apply some hard common sense.
Posted by Perkins at 3:52 PM | Comments (1)