and they believe some may be closed in a few years time
Ealing's libraries still face an uncertain future according the Conservative opposition.
At the 5 July Cabinet Meeting, they challenged the ruling administration to amend their Library Strategy to reflect a verbal guarantee (given at the 14 June Council) that Hanwell, Northfields, Perivale, and Northolt Leisure Centre Libraries will be saved from closure.
They say Labour refused to amend the Report to give that guarantee and 'made a rather startling admission' that they might not be able to afford the £5.5M in 3 years time to keep the libraries open and some might still need to close.
Cllr David Millican, Leader of the Conservative Opposition said:
“Labour have refused to commit in writing to keeping the Libraries open and made the startling admission that they may not be able to afford the £5.5M in 3 years time to keep our libraries open.
Labour are clearly hoping that residents will have short memories if the libraries are threatened in the future. However, I am sure that it will be a long time before residents forget £5.5M being spent on the Southall car park.”
Labour leader Cllr Julian Bell said :
"If the Conservative's had been following the issue and reading papers from the start they would have realised this is the position we are in. We have said all along that we need to find considerable savings from the library budget.
'' It is no secret that we need to find £85m worth of savings from the council's budgets because of the cuts from the Tory-led government.
''The strategy we approved on Tuesday sets out how we will find those savings in the library service and as Cllr Dheer said last month we are not proposing to close any libraries. It really is time the Conservatives engaged with the issues rather than issuing press releases designed to scare local residents."
6 July 2011
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