An informal public meeting will be held by the Save Headington Library Group next Wednesday 22 June from 19.30-21.00 at St Andrew’s School to discuss the latest county proposals for libraries.
If you would like to pick up a copy of the feedback form to send back your comments to County, please drop in and collect one with no obligation to stay
It is likely that the County will gauge the amount of potential volunteer support (as distinct from county paid staff) available in each library’s locality from the responses givento one of the questions in the questionnaires. Currently it is proposed that Headington Library will remain staffed and will continue with its present opening hours but comments and feedback are invited till 30 September.
If you would prefer to fill in an online comments form, please click here
Some of the notes I have made on the consultation include:
General comments
• The revised proposals are informed by ‘local needs assessments’. These should have been done before. This has produced a much more comprehensive offer and makes more practical sense
• In previous meetings with the county, the statement was made that Headington was on the original closure list because it had good public transport links to the Westgate Library and wasn’t near the shops! In this document, Headington is given extra index points for being accessible using public transport and gets top marks for being within half a mile of the District Shopping Centre!
• The introduction of self-service to all libraries implies there will be associated reductions in library employees
Proposed use of volunteers
• What will happen to the smaller libraries if insufficient numbers of volunteers come forward?
• If volunteers are found to help staff Headington Library in extended opening hours, will this lead to progressive cuts in professionally staffed hours in future and extended volunteer working?
• Who will coordinate the roster of volunteers?
• What are the health and safety implications of lone working by volunteers?
• Many residents in Headington already have jobs as volunteers, there is a concern about capacity
Old Marston
• The index points scores for libraries within the City boundary have been calculated separately to those libraries based elsewhere in the county
• Old Marston has been compared with Oxford Central Library, Temple Cowley, Summertown, Headington, Littlemore and Blackbird Leys so its points score would always be low
• If treated the same as libraries elsewhere in the county, it would be eligible for many more points. For example there are 4536 people living within half a mile of Chipping Norton Library and it is awarded 37 index points yet there are 4881 residents living within half a mile of Old Marston Library and it is awarded zero points (because it is being compared with City libraries)
Headington Library
• The total index points score for Headington Library is 218, not 217
• The index points score is based on a number of factors applicable to those within a half mile radius of the library, including numbers of pupils enrolled in schools, the number of children who live in poverty and the number of children achieving less than 5 A*- C grades at GCSE – the needs assessment data for these are low for Headington Library because no account is made of the needs of its wider catchment area of Wood Farm and Barton
• The data for Headington is factually incorrect on the audit of current services within each library – Headington is not credited with book stock in languages other than English whereas it has collections in Urdu, Chinese, French, Hindi and Spanish mentioned elsewhere in the documentation
• The data for Headington is factually incorrect on the audit of current activities within each library – it is not credited for computer help sessions yet these are offered