FOUR borough councillors have said they are still not satisfied with the safety of the new Libraries Unlocked scheme operating at Redditch Library.
Coun Sharon Harvey, Jane Spilsbury, Juliet Barker Smith and Monica Stringfellow wrote to Worcestershire County Council to seek reassurance the county had done its due diligence to ensure library users were safe during the unstaffed hours.
In Redditch, the staffed hours are 9am until 5pm on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, from 9am to 1pm Wednesday and Friday and 9am until 4pm on Saturday.
They said: “We recognise opening the library outside regular hours may benefit some residents but we are incredibly disappointed to see Wednesday mornings and Friday afternoons will be part of these ‘unlocked’ hours.”
They are also asking what safety measures will be put in place to ensure women and girls feel safe in an unstaffed building.
“The Redditch people have demonstrated their love and commitment to our town centre library with a lengthy and successful campaign to prevent its demolition.
“As the second busiest library in the county, it is vital we protect our services from further attack.”
In response Coun Ian Cresswell, Worcestershire County Council’s cabinet member for environment and communities, said the scheme was the preferred transformation approach for futureproofing the library network in a context of continuing financial pressure.
He said the open library service model was a well-established model in the UK public library sector and had proven to be a safe and effective way of extending community access to libraries since first being introduced in 2014.
Coun Cresswell confirmed the scheme had been subject to numerous scrutiny sessions by the council’s corporate and communities overview and scrutiny panel, including visits by panel members to open library locations in other library authorities to see the model in operation.
The consultation for the scheme was conducted in 2018 to 2019, which Coun Harvey said was shocking.
Coun Cresswell acknowledges that several groups are disadvantaged by Libraries Unlocked – namely disabled users and young families using pushchairs – and says the staffed library opening hours are retained throughout the week.
However Coun Harvey said: “We acknowledge that the Libraries Unlocked programme increases opening hours, but we refuse to accept the reduction in staffed hours as a result of this finance driven policy.
“Worcestershire County Council expects library use to dip as a result of the reduction in staffed hours, with a recovery in approximately two years time.
“Why is this acceptable? Should we not always be working towards increased library use?
“It is my opinion Libraries Unlocked is introduced to save money – and this is at the expense of our statutory service.”
