DEPARTMENT OF LIBRARIES AND THEATRE
Central Library
St. Peter's Square
Manchester M2 SPD

Mr, J, Myers
National Heritage Review of Public
Library Service
Aslib,
Information House,
20-24 Old Street
London EC1V 9AP

28th June 1994

Thank you for your letter of 12th May inviting us to give evidence on behalf of the City Council.

The following response was approved by the Arts and Leisure Committee on 27th June 1994.

"Manchester City Council welcomes the opportunity to contribute to the Review of the Public Library Service. In so doing, we would remind the Aslib Consultancy Team that the City opened its first public library in 1852 and has a long and proud tradition of providing good quality and relevant library services. Since 1852 we have continued to invest in our library services at a level much higher than is the norm and by constantly adapting them or developing new services Manchester has established an infrastructure and range of services which are relevant to the needs of local people but which also attract considerable usage from outside the City. In responding to the request for evidence it is important to state clearly at the outset that the City does not wish the outcome to be the promulgation of a set of national standards for the provision of library services which is based on a minimalist approach. That would not serve the interests of library users, particularly Manchester's library users from within and without the City.

It should be emphasised that we do not regard this fundamental belief as a means of merely reinforcing the status quo in terms of public library service provision. We recognise the need to continue to adapt and innovate as the world around us changes. There is no need to repeat the well known litany of external factors for change and threats to the 'traditional library'. What is important is that public libraries should not be prevented from so adapting and innovating by a prescriptive framework which becomes in reality a straightjacket. In the main, public libraries have succeeded to date precisely because Central Government has not attempted to strictly define precisely what they should or should not do but rather has adopted a more liberal approach. The required 'national action' is to support and encourage best practice which is relevant to local needs not to attempt to determine what the minimum local needs should be.

It is our firm belief that the range and quality of public library services in an area reflect the local authority's policy with regard to libraries, within the overall budgetary constraints in which it has to operate. The most significant factors in terms of our management of our libraries compared with, say, the 1950's and 1960's are the rigid controls on our total local authority expenditure, the continuing decline In the population of the City and the consequent change in the composition of the City's population. Despite our reduced resources we have manage to adapt our service to reflect changing needs by redeploying resources but there is no doubt that the progressive reduction In the total resources we have been able to devote to libraries has had a damaging effect on their quality. Nevertheless, what we provide reflects our local priorities compared with other services and within the library service.

Hence, we regard the pilot project in Dorset to examine the establishment of a whole service trust with grave alarm. Whilst we acknowledge the validity of establishing trusts in certain circumstances we do not believe that the transfer of the management of a whole library service to a trust is in the interests of the public. Whatever their good intentions, trustees are not elected by local people nor are they accountable in the way local Councillors are. We believe that public libraries are too important a part of our social and community fabric to be handed over to the control of what could become self-perpetuating sectional interests. Public libraries must be accessible to all; address needs as well as demands; and perform an essential democratic role.

In order to illustrate these beliefs and values which inform and underpin our policies for libraries in Manchester we enclose a copy of our Aims and Objectives which we review each year as part of our service planning process. It is within this context that we turn to the specific questions you have posed:-

i. What services should form the free 'core' of public library provision across the country?

This question was addressed by the LISC Working Party charged with drafting its response to the Green Paper "Financing our Public Libraries" in 1988 , It could not come up with a satisfactory definition and we do not believe the question is any easier to answer 6 years later. The fundamental implication of the question is that there is a minimum level which ought to be free and the rest can be charged for. A national framework which determines this 'across the country' poses a severe threat to the interests of many library users. For example, we do not wish to charge for the loan of books to Manchester users but it has to be accepted that some people cannot access information via books. Hence, we loan spoken word cassettes and talking books free of charge to visually impaired people. The critical point is that the local authority should have the choice to determine what it should provide free of charge in order to meet the needs of its citizens. Accessibility does not just mean the ability to walk into a library free of charge, it means tailoring and delivering services in ways that are responsive to the different circumstances of the different groups which constitute the local community served by the local library. A democratically controlled library service serving the interests of a democratic country and its citizens should not construct charging barriers which exclude citizens from fully participating in that democracy because of a lack of ability to pay the going rate for accessing information and imagination.

ii, On what types of new service should we concentrate our attention? To what extent could such services build on librarians' skills, on electronic media, systems and databases, and on the library as a centre of community activity? Have you already taken initiatives we should know about?

We find this a difficult and confusing question. The Implication is that librarians may not have utilised their skills to develop their services but the problem is that we do not know what you mean by 'new' and we do not know what you do not know about our initiatives. For example, In recent years we have opened a European Information Unit using traditional and electronic information sources; developed extensive library services for visually impaired people utilising various media and equipment; developed library and information services for Vietnamese people; established homework Clubs at several District Libraries; organised an annual Festival of Manchester Writing; promoted dramatic performances at Mobile Library Stops as part of our contribution to Manchester City of Drama and numerous other relevant activities. Are these new? Are they initiatives? On a national scale maybe not but on a local scale they are; they are relevant; they utilise the skills of our staff (non-professional and professional) and they meet local needs for information, education and culture.

iii. How do you see future priorities for public libraries?

In the age of the information super-highway; domestic working; and home-based total entertainment it will be critical to provide places where people can meet for social interaction. Libraries will become even more important as community focal points; opportunity centres for leisure, recreational and educational pursuits; arts and activity centres; the *antidote to couch-potatoism' and a meeting point for all people who choose a more communal less individualistic lifestyle. They will have an important democratic role by continuing to provide alternative views of the world to that published by the mass publishing/broadcasting conglomerates. They will preserve the tradition of reading as a mass recreational activity because people will continue to want access to the written word in book form. The book will survive and so will libraries if they provide access to a wider range of books than any one individual could ever hope or wish to purchase. No other public or private sector organisation currently meets this special of roles and services and the public library will continue to be relevant to communities providing it adapts to meet these fundamental needs.

i iv. What factors and considerations should we allow for in setting a framework for local choice?

Again we find this question difficult to understand. Who is meant by 'we'? National government, Aslib, professional librarians, local authority members, the public we serve or a mixture of some or all of these? Whose framework for local choice? The most constructive approach to ensuring that libraries become more relevant in the future is to adopt an approach which permits a general competence to provide whatever services are needed locally and to remove the problem of determining whether or not a proposed development might be ultra vires. The appropriate framework is local analysis of local needs within a system of local accountability.

V. On what basis, and from which sources, should public libraries obtain their funding in the future?

If public libraries are to maintain and develop the role we believe they should perform as a common good accessible to all there can be no alternative to the vast majority of their funds being provided from public sources via taxation. In recent years it has become fashionable to question whether the funding principles established 144 years ago are still valid 'when resources are scarce'. Public libraries have always provided a resource redistribution and reatilisation role on the basis of human need and collective responsibility and provision. It is difficult to envisage that that role is less necessary today or will become so in the immediate future. Downward pressure on local authority budgets has generated the drive to seek alternative funding via income generation and sponsorship. There can be no basic objection to increasing income providing it does not distort the fundamental role of the public library in the first place. Sadly, the reality has been a pursuit of income to replace public funding leading to a distortion of the library's true role in society. Nor is the reduced public funding provided on a sound and reasonable basis as there is little connection between local choice and local taxation. Manchester City Council has to address the burden of historic public expectations of its Central Library and a total public disregard of local government boundaries. Hence, its provision far exceeds the norm of a standard service at a standard cost. Because these special circumstances have never been acknowledged by Central Government the City Council has faced increasing difficulties in maintaining services which are demonstrably highly valued by the public outcry which erupted when library opening hours had to be drastically reduced in 1990 in order to reduce expenditure. Listening to local opinion, the City Council has since restored library opening hours but in terms of the Central Library that local opinion extended well beyond the City's boundaries.

vi. What approaches and steps should we consider or recommend on the marketing of existing and new public library services in the future?

We do not consider it the role of the ASLIB) Consultancy to market our services. We regard marketing as an essential management responsibility in providing relevant local services which effectively meet local needs. For example, we have established a thriving and successful Chinese Library Service because we did our market research and now provide a range of services in the right locations to meet the needs of our local Chinese community. This was a new service in 1986 and is now an established part of our mainstream activities. We cannot envisage how any national recommendations on marketing would have assisted this local process. If by marketing you mean the promotion of the development of public library services. on a national basis we would welcome the establishment of a public library research agency to investigate new opportunities for libraries.

vii. How can public libraries best address the special needs of particular groups - actual and potential?

We welcome this question in terms of the approach to needs rather than merely addressing demands, but are concerned by the use of the word 'special'. For too long libraries and other public services have approached the needs of certain groups from the perspective that they pose a special challenge compared with the normal service users. From the viewpoint of the individual user, or non-users who are unable to access the services they require, their needs are no more or less special than anybody else's. If public libraries are to be truly accessible they need to determine how they should organise themselves to meet the needs of the people they aim to serve. The key question is whether the 'actual and potential' users are the problem or whether our organisation automatically bars some people from using our services. In other words, we should not think of groups as 'special' but rather determine our service delivery priorities and ensure that our mechanisms enable us to deliver those services. Therefore, the best way of addressing the needs of the different groups which comprise the local communities served by local libraries is to determine policy priorities for the library service; analyse the local community and adapt service delivery methods to ensure that the policy is effectively implemented. For example, it was not difficult for us to establish in 1985 that we were not complying with our Equal Opportunities Policy in terms of service delivery to the local Chinese community. By establishing a Chinese Library with appropriate collections of materials operated by staff with appropriate written and oral linguistic skills many of the potential library users became actual users. The problem before 1985 belonged to the library not that ?special' group of local citizens who contributed to the upkeep of the library service but did not receive relevant benefit from it because they did not have the same choice as other citizens whether or not to use the library. In other words, it is necessary for the local library to address the needs of its citizens, within its policy priorities, and adapt to meet those needs rather than to regard certain groups of people as 'special' problems.

We welcome the intention of the consultants to survey the views of non-users of library services as well as users. We know from local experience that surveying the views of non-users is a difficult and time-consuming exercise but one which provides much valuable information. Hopefully, this national sampling frame will .be of sufficient size and sophistication to be able to test the relationship between different individuals' needs/wants and the range and accessibility of the local library services available to them.

To conclude, it is our view that there will remain a vital social role for public libraries into the next century and that they will best be able to perform that role if they remain democratically accountable and thereby more responsive to the needs of local people. We believe that any attempt to shift the balance of funding from a public to a private/individual basis would undermine the fundamental values and democratic role of the public library service. The key to the provision of effective services is clear determination of local policy priori and, of course, adequate resources to deliver those services."