Literacy news
Library Modernisation Review released today
23 Mar 2010
The Library Modernisation Review has been published today by Minister of State for Culture, Media & Sport, Margaret Hodge. The review calls for a new strategic body for libraries, bringing together the functions of the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA), the Advisory Council on Libraries and the Registrar of Public Lending Right.
The body "should be an improvement and development agency and should have vested in it greater authority than is afforded to the MLA in its current form”, the review states. The review also recommends a "national core offer" on libraries from all local authorities, including membership from birth, to be complemented by a "local offer" to include commitments on book stock and events programmes. It proposes a ban on library authorities charging for e-books.
However, the review has attracted criticism from Shadow Minister of State for Culture, Media and Sport Ed Vaizey as well as from library campaigner Tim Coates, despite being welcomed by the Chartered Institute for Library and Information Professionals (CILIP).
Coates and Vaizey have criticised the review for a lack of substance.
Vaizey said library users would be "sorely disappointed" by the work, commenting:
"The library review has been delayed for more than two years. Now it has come out, it says very little. What good ideas it has have been copied from our announcements, which we made last year, namely a national library card and a strategic agency for libraries, as well as clearer guidance on what constitutes a good library service. The tragedy is if they had bothered to think hard about what libraries need, they could have had all this up and running by now."
However, CILIP president Biddy Fisher said:
"I welcome the government's commitment to delivering a first rate free service to everyone; they now need to deliver on their recommendations and provide appropriate investment in the public library service."
Read more at The Bookseller: http://www.thebookseller.com/news/114861-critics-pounce-on-library-review.html
