Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Libraries to Take Burden of Dispensing Council Services
In a sign of the cash-strapped times in which we live, two of Haringey's biggest libraries are to become key customer service centres for the Council.
With council staff being cut-back and offices closing, Haringey Council took the decision earlier this year to use two of its biggest libraries to offer servives such as parking permits and benefits claims.
Plans for Wood Green Library will see some staff transferring from the Wood Green Customer Service Centre offering a range of services at the library such as paying for parking permits and speaking to someone in relation to a range of council services.
Under the plans for Marcus Garvey library, customer services staff and equipment from nearby Apex House would be transferred to Marcus Garvey.
The Council say that by using the space in the libraries better, there will be no reduction in library services on offer.
Plans for Wood Green Library will go on show at two drop-in sessions on Thursday and Friday this week.
So, are these changes an inevitable development in the current climate which will "keep libraries at the very heart of our communities", or do they represent an avoidable erosion of Haringey's library service?
Tags for Forum Posts: libraries
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by BBL on
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This has been on the cards for sometime.
http://www.haringey.gov.uk/community-and-leisure/voluntary-sector/c...
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I can confidently refute the rumour that the Dear Leader is giving over half her office space in River Park House to a Welfare Rights organisation, a food bank, and an artisanal micro brewery, in order to "extend the offer" and bring Cllr Claire Kober to "the heart of the community".
"For forty years you heard from my predecessors on this day different variations on the same theme; how our country was flourishing, how many million tons of steel we produced, how happy we all were, how we trusted our government, and what bright perspectives were unfolding in front of us.
"I assume you did not propose me for this office so that I, too, would lie to you.
"Our country is not flourishing ... The enormous creative and spiritual potential of our nations is not being used sensibly."...
"The worst thing is that we live in a contaminated moral environment. We fell morally ill because we became used to saying something different from what we thought. We learned not to believe in anything, to ignore one another, to care only about ourselves. Concepts such as love, friendship, compassion, humility or forgiveness lost their depth and dimension, and for many of us they represented only psychological peculiarities, or they resembled gone astray greetings from ancient times, a little ridiculous in the era of computers and spaceships."
- From Václav Havel's first New Year's Address to the Nation as President of the post-communist Czechoslovakia, January 1, 1990 (Source: English translation)
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Permalink Reply by Gordon T on
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Not eroded as much as many other library services, I think. I carry no torch for the council but so far they have kept all branches open, maintained the opening hours, and kept adding new stock, though paid staff are fewer, and more to go this year, and there are now more volunteers.
That's not the case for some other London Councils e.g. Harrow has just closed 4 branches, Camden shifted some branches to a volunteer-only basis, Greenwich outsourced its library service - this page on the Public Libraries News website leads to a list of changes or proposals by each local authority, if more comparative detail is wanted.
The Wood Green library has not been 100% library floorspace for well over a decade I think, but the Marcus Garvey alterations look rather more likely to reduce its bookstock as well as floorspace.
PS Alan Stanton please stay on-topic - or stick to one-liners.
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We will have to agree to differ, Gordon. "Living within the Truth" was Vaclav Havel's aim and hallmark and message. Inspired by Alexander Solzhenitsyn's essay: "Live Not By Lies".
I would have written something different if the Council PR team and Cllrs Kober and Jason Arthur had said and written something along the lines you suggested. If they'd clearly told the whole truth and said that yes, they'd made pledges about keeping all the libraries open. But that brutal and unnecessary Government cuts meant this was incredibly difficult. And so they had to reduce floorspace and locate other services in library premises. As well as reducing staff and sacking qualified librarians. Just like other local councils. But, as you have said, and unlike many local councils they would do their best to avoid closures.
But they did not give this honest open explanation. Instead they pretended this was an improvement. An extension of the offer. A clever redesign.
That is why in my view they are failing to "live within the truth". And why I will continue to speak out against the "contaminated moral environment" in which many of my former Council colleagues now operate.
You can, if you wish skip over my comments. But I assure you in all seriousness that, for me, for Haringey Council they are the topic.
You think I'm mistaken? Please don't rely on my words. Triangulate. Talk instead to the Library Friends groups and campaigners.
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Well yes, I too am used to reading between the lines and regret all the doublespeak, but you might have posted your second (direct and useful) comment straight away, instead of the very oblique and distractingly long first one.
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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List of closed/transferred libraries here
http://www.publiclibrariesnews.com/about-public-libraries-news/news...
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Haringey council continuously and cynically employs double speak and propaganda like something out of Orwell's 1984. 'Bad is good'
Why can't they just tell us the plain crude truth and let us deal with it? Are we just too stupid or deprived or something?
Come to Tottenham and see the damage the council is planning and calling it 'regeneration' when in fact it is just barely disguised, intense property speculation that will benefit those can already fend for themselves while the most 'vulnerable' will get shafted. But even these development schemes are ill-conceived, mediocre and will result in new poorly planned developments.
Of course there are a few token projects that pay a bit more than lip service for the existing local community. But the valuable and much-needed SERVICES are getting slashed. But these are what affect the quality of life not 22 storey 'gateway' buildings.
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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Why can't they just tell us the plain crude truth and let us deal with it? Are we just too stupid or deprived or something?
JJ, I've often thought along similar lines.
In sweating our asset Finsbury Park with Wireless, the Council claims it will lead to park improvements. Any positive improvements are small, few and far between.
Meanwhile we hear promises that any damage to the park will be picked up by the renter.
The first point to make is that the Council expects damage to its (our) property, unlike a regular landlord, who probably wouldn't rent out with that expectation. This is not an ordinary rental and the public will have seen the state of the park after each of the last Wireless concerts.
A little of the damage is fully rectified, much is partly fixed and some is left undone. The cycle of damage and repairs doesn't leave us at zero: after each step forwards, we go two steps back and the park is further degraded each summer, following the Council Cabinet's major events policy.
Which brings me to a nonsensical claim by spin doctors. The area on the east side of the park – dubbed 'Serengeti' by David Lammy MP – is alluded to in the on-line publication, Haringey People Extra.
Under, Work underway to resurface Finsbury Park pathways, the Council claims that,
Grass, which has been affected by the recent hot weather, will also be re-seeded after the next period of significant rainfall.
The suggestion – that grass that was severely trampled by tens of thousands of feet, was "affected by the recent hot weather" – is just preposterous. Only the most credulous and gullible will believe it: it's an insult to the intelligence of most people in the Borough.
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The grass was probably affected by the weather but it would be made worse by the Intensive use and damage caused by the inappropraite and short-termed-vision rental for Wireless.
Can it recover?
Then there are all the opportunitry costs! The 'amenity value' is forfeited by the community during the down times before during and after the festival in that period of the year when the park would be most used by local people - summer! Are these factored into the equation?
But I do not expect any answer from the present Haringey Council regime. They probably believe their own propaganda!
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