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Survival of libraries needs passion and commitment
• YOUR insightful piece (Library reform squad don’t use book service, survey reveals, August 6) reports Councillor Flick Rea’s own frequent use of her local libraries.
She has always been a great supporter of Belsize library and we are grateful to her for her efforts to keep our much-loved library open.
If the other councillors you surveyed are indeed members of a committee involved in overhauling Camden’s libraries and are truly as disinterested in reading as they say, what possible hope can there be that libraries as we know and love them can survive?
You might as well put a team of anorexics in charge of a Michelin-starred restaurant kitchen.
The energy and enthusiasm with which all the local libraries’ friends groups support their branches is evidence that the users are passionate about their libraries.
Please let us see the same commitment from those who have the future of these libraries in their hands.
Elaine Hallgarten
a friend of Belsize Library
Between the lines
• AT last some enlightened soul has come up with that “key” word “imagination” so sadly lacking right across the board of the decision-makers down to politicians.
Some background in “comparative literature” would benefit us all.
Einstein knew this when he said: “Imagination is more important than knowledge".
Good on Councillor Flick Rea actually reading and borrowing books (though apparently unaware there is still some eight million of us who don’t use computers) as she is photographed in Swiss Cottage library not with a book or a live human being librarian but with a machine thus joining the lemming-like hurtling towards the cliff edge.
Eileen Earnshaw
BA ALA
librarian of the old school, Oriel Place, NW3
They’re not just for the academic élite
• YOUR survey (August 6) of various councillors’ reading habits, I suspect, provides a snapshot of library use broadly similar to any other group in the borough.
Some regularly borrow books; others visit for quiet study, and many enjoy the various other facilities on offer at Camden’s libraries.
Personally I visit my local library at Queen’s Crescent most weeks. Library users choosing to borrow CDs is hardly a new innovation or the stuff of scandal.
In fact we need to get away from the idea that libraries are only for the academically elite.
Any changes need to reflect the wishes of all those who value our libraries, whether they are interested in Kylie, Kandinsky, or anything in between.
There is no doubt that scrutiny committees work best when interested residents are prepared to engage with us, so that we can properly reflect a range of views and expertise when quizzing the council’s cabinet members.
In the last year, the committee which I chair has heard deputations on topics as diverse as cycling, parking and planning enforcement.
I have also, privately, invited the Camden Libraries Users Group to contribute to the work of the committee, and am happy to repeat this invitation in public.
Cllr Matt Sanders
Chair, Culture and Environment Scrutiny Committee
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