Empower, Inform, Enrich The modernisation review of public libraries

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#1'>There is talk of a crisis in public libraries (although from the inside of a Discovery Centre or Idea Store it is perhaps harder to see what this crisis is), and the all-party parliamentary review originated by Lyn Brown MP recently proposed a National Development Agency as a possible solution to the need for national leadership. I would wholly support this idea but it is, of course, not new. It was first suggested by Charles Leadbeater and Demos in the April 2003 report “Overdue – how to create a modern public library service”, commissioned by the Laser Foundation and launched at a seminar in July 2003.The report is well worth reading or re-reading for a trenchant analysis of our current situation and potential solutions. </blockquote> Permalink:
1 There is talk of a crisis in public libraries (although from the inside of a Discovery Centre or Idea Store it is perhaps harder to see what this crisis is), and the all-party parliamentary review originated by Lyn Brown MP recently proposed a National Development Agency as a possible solution to the need for national leadership. I would wholly support this idea but it is, of course, not new. It was first suggested by Charles Leadbeater and Demos in the April 2003 report “Overdue – how to create a modern public library service”, commissioned by the Laser Foundation and launched at a seminar in July 2003.The report is well worth reading or re-reading for a trenchant analysis of our current situation and potential solutions.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#2'>It is time to end the situation whereby individual local authorities just do their own thing (some well, some badly, some plain mediocre), with MLA/DCMS exhorting them from the sidelines (but exhorting them to do what?) and trying to tackle every problem with a bureaucratic tangle and another form to fill in. Also, DCMS does not have the vital control of the purse strings which would enable it to have real influence and, for example, practical enforcement of the Public Libraries and Museums Act. At the moment, the impact of the public library service, as a national “force”, is less than the sum of its parts, and this has to change. It is not fundamentally the fault of local authorities, individually or collectively, or indeed of MLA/DCMS and their staff – they do what they are enabled to do; rather it is a national structural failure, of organisation and budget responsibility, as Leadbeater pointed out in his report. Moving around the deck-chairs within MLA, etc will not change anything!</blockquote> Permalink:
2 It is time to end the situation whereby individual local authorities just do their own thing (some well, some badly, some plain mediocre), with MLA/DCMS exhorting them from the sidelines (but exhorting them to do what?) and trying to tackle every problem with a bureaucratic tangle and another form to fill in. Also, DCMS does not have the vital control of the purse strings which would enable it to have real influence and, for example, practical enforcement of the Public Libraries and Museums Act. At the moment, the impact of the public library service, as a national “force”, is less than the sum of its parts, and this has to change. It is not fundamentally the fault of local authorities, individually or collectively, or indeed of MLA/DCMS and their staff – they do what they are enabled to do; rather it is a national structural failure, of organisation and budget responsibility, as Leadbeater pointed out in his report. Moving around the deck-chairs within MLA, etc will not change anything!

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#3'>I think most practising librarians would probably agree that the only successful thing that MLA has done (i.e. with a real outcome and impact) is the People’s Network – a national initiative, with mainly national funding but delivered locally. The Reading Agency’s Summer Reading Challenge is a similar success story where a national initiative is implemented locally, with significant cost savings. The former had largely central funding whereas the latter doesn’t, but both are successful in doing something real and practical, out there with the public, and getting the best of both worlds – national co-ordination, efficiency, publicity, profile, etc but with a strong local character. Both are examples of how a National Development Agency could work where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.</blockquote> Permalink:
3 I think most practising librarians would probably agree that the only successful thing that MLA has done (i.e. with a real outcome and impact) is the People’s Network – a national initiative, with mainly national funding but delivered locally. The Reading Agency’s Summer Reading Challenge is a similar success story where a national initiative is implemented locally, with significant cost savings. The former had largely central funding whereas the latter doesn’t, but both are successful in doing something real and practical, out there with the public, and getting the best of both worlds – national co-ordination, efficiency, publicity, profile, etc but with a strong local character. Both are examples of how a National Development Agency could work where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#4'>Any review should run as fast as it can from the red-tape solutions that are likely to fudge the real issues, and show real blue-sky thinking by defining a vision for a national public library service with a strong local face and by concentrating on converting the public libraries element of MLA, and its inward-looking bureaucratic and peripheral role, into a National Development Agency to implement the vision. </blockquote> Permalink:
4 Any review should run as fast as it can from the red-tape solutions that are likely to fudge the real issues, and show real blue-sky thinking by defining a vision for a national public library service with a strong local face and by concentrating on converting the public libraries element of MLA, and its inward-looking bureaucratic and peripheral role, into a National Development Agency to implement the vision.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#5'>Its brief should be to define, enable and enforce a high quality national public library service but also to do “real” things for the service, on the model of the</blockquote> Permalink:
5 Its brief should be to define, enable and enforce a high quality national public library service but also to do “real” things for the service, on the model of the

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#6'>People’s Network/Summer Reading Challenge; its remit</blockquote> Permalink:
6 People’s Network/Summer Reading Challenge; its remit

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#7'>should be robust in terms of the Public Libraries and Museums Act, but also carefully balanced between national initiatives and control and local needs and implementation. It would not run the public library service but lead it. And, of course, it should have a proper budget – “golden teeth” perhaps?</blockquote> Permalink:
7 should be robust in terms of the Public Libraries and Museums Act, but also carefully balanced between national initiatives and control and local needs and implementation. It would not run the public library service but lead it. And, of course, it should have a proper budget – “golden teeth” perhaps?

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#8'>The creation of such an organisation is the only way to provide the national leadership that is now so lacking. Of course, there is the question of potential tensions between national and local agendas and budgets, but the two models I have given above are practical examples of fruitful co-operation between the national and the local and I am not aware that they have caused too much friction. And frankly I don’t think the national infrastructure could be much worse than it is now. With a high-profile, dynamic head (please not a Tzar!) – a leading author or “sensible” media person perhaps – and a mandate for excellence and real, direct improvements, a National Development Agency could transform the lack-lustre national image that the public library service currently has (even if not wholly justified) but without trampling on or destroying its local identity.</blockquote> Permalink:
8 The creation of such an organisation is the only way to provide the national leadership that is now so lacking. Of course, there is the question of potential tensions between national and local agendas and budgets, but the two models I have given above are practical examples of fruitful co-operation between the national and the local and I am not aware that they have caused too much friction. And frankly I don’t think the national infrastructure could be much worse than it is now. With a high-profile, dynamic head (please not a Tzar!) – a leading author or “sensible” media person perhaps – and a mandate for excellence and real, direct improvements, a National Development Agency could transform the lack-lustre national image that the public library service currently has (even if not wholly justified) but without trampling on or destroying its local identity.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://writetoreply.org/empowerinformenrich/adrian-olsen-retired-member-of-cilip-and-former-head-of-libraries-and-lifelong-learning-london-borough-of-southwark/#9'>The above is a slightly edited version of a letter published in CILIP Update in December 2008.</blockquote> Permalink:
9 The above is a slightly edited version of a letter published in CILIP Update in December 2008.

Tags: Adrian Olsen, Charles Leadbeater, CILIP, Discovery Centre, dynamic head, Head, high-profile, Idea Store, Laser, Laser Foundation, leading author, London Borough, Lyn Brown MP, media person, member, National Development Agency, possible solution, potential solutions, Reading Agency, red-tape solutions, Retired

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