Residents First

Hammersmith Library set for revamp

While scores of libraries across the country face the axe as councils look to make cash savings, Hammersmith Library is set for a £1.65million revamp.

Hammersmith & Fulham Council has been able to protect all of its libraries from closure by combining management and back office overheads with Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster councils.

The council also uses its Section 106 powers to ensure that developers contribute to local neighbourhood improvements once planning permission has been granted. The £1.65million for Hammersmith Library
has been secured following Section 106 negotiations with the developer of the Hammersmith Grove NCP site, Development Securities.

H&F Council wants to take the best elements of the 1905 Grade II listed Hammersmith Library and combine it with the modern feel of the new and hugely popular Shepherds Bush Library.

YouTube film of Boris and Peter Andre at Shepherd's Bush Library

 

Boris visits Shepherd's Bush Library to announce child literacy volunteers scheme

The Mayor of London Boris Johnson came to Shepherd's Buish Library today and announced that he wants to recruit 2,000 'Library Champions' under a new Team London programme designed to help local communities get even more out of their local library through new services and activities.

£100,000 is being provided to develop the Team London 'Love Libraries' scheme, which will see people recruited over the next six months to help provide a range of library based activities in at least ten boroughs. This includes supporting Londoners of all ages with reading and literacy, helping to set up reading groups and people to get online, including for help with job searches, skills and education.

Libraries throughout the capital have been using volunteers to provide these services for a number of years already. The Mayor's new scheme will build upon this innovative practice, which has led to more Londoners using their libraries and more books being taken out. In Merton, for example, where they have partnered with the local Volunteer Centre and now have over 350 volunteers, library usage has risen by over 15% and stock issues by over 200,000 in three years.

Hammersmith Library best for mums

Hammersmith Library is the latest attraction in the borough to be named by mothers as one of the best free place to go in London.

The library, on Shepherds Bush Road, joins Bishops Park and Ravenscourt Park who have also recently won coveted Netmums awards.

There are plenty of facilities and events at the library that make the library a worthy winner of the award. The venue hosts under-fives' story and rhyme time sessions which are hugely popular with mothers and their children. Sessions take place on  Wednesdays from 10.15am to 10.45am and from 11am to 11.30am and also on Thursdays from 10.30am to 11.30am.

Shared back office costs saves libraries

Three flagship London boroughs are set to combine their library services as part of a groundbreaking move to secure the future of public libraries in the capital.

Westminster, Hammersmith & Fulham and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea councils have drawn up proposals to combine library services, saving taxpayers more than £1million a year and ensuring all of their 21 public libraries remain safe from closure.

Council leaders are next week set to go ahead with the plans which will mean, once fully implemented, residents will gain access to around 1 million books, hundreds of entertainment and cultural events and scores of weekly skills and education classes.

The move means that a one year old, living to the average life expectancy of 81, would need to read at least 26 books every day for the rest of their lives if they wanted to get through the whole Tri-Borough collection. The new arrangements will boost the drive to improve literacy in the capital through increased access to children’s libraries and specialised services such as regular homework clubs.

It comes as councils across the country are axing vital library services, with as many as 25 libraries expected to be closed in the capital alone over the next 12 months.

Cllr Greg Smith, H&F Council Cabinet Member for Residents’ Services, said:

"When money is tight some organisation’s first reaction is to slash services and try to shift the blame. Others think innovatively and develop solutions that save money, increase choice and improve services so they are more accessible and convenient for residents.

“Literacy is a fundamental cornerstone of a modern society and we need to get youngsters off their sofas and into our libraries. This is why we are finding original ways to strengthen and protect as many of our libraries as we can. Residents across the three boroughs will soon have access to more books than anyone could realistically expect to read in a lifetime.”

The proposals are being backed by the Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries Ed Vaizey MP. "When funding is short, it is important that local authorities find innovative ways to
provide this vital service, said Mr Vaizey. "Merging services across three boroughs is vastly preferable to library closures and I hope that other local authorities will come up with their own forward-looking plans for keeping libraries open."

Councillors at three separate Cabinet meetings are set to debate the proposals which also include:

• Combining fostering and adoption services and youth offending services, with the creation of a single Local Safeguarding Children Board. In total this would save nearly £199,000 a year by 2014/15.
• Combining environment management teams in H&F and RBKC, saving £1.5 million with a 48 per cent reduction in senior management (14 posts).

The library proposals are part of wider plans to combine some council services across the three boroughs in a bid to save £35 million a year by 2014/15. Adult, children’s, environmental and corporate services
are also expected to be combined with around 500 jobs going in management, back office and support roles.

Westminster Council leader Cllr Colin Barrow said:

"In these tough times, sharing back office functions and management with our neighbouring councils to drive out needless cost is the sensible and practical course of action to deliver savings to local taxpayers and protect frontline services such as our libraries.

“Throughout this process, we will ensure that each council continues to commission its own services and local priorities will still be driven by local people."

Collectively the three authorities must save £100 million by 2014/15. They have each signed a ‘Sovereignty Guarantee’ to safeguard local autonomy, responsiveness and identity. Each of the councils will retain their own councillors and decision making processes. Services key to local areas, such as housing management, licensing and planning will be not be combined.

H&F and RBKC have agreed to share a chief executive from October 2011. The two councils already share senior management posts in legal services, highways and finance.

RBKC Council leader Cllr Sir Merrick Cockell said:

“We want Tri-borough working to be about much more than just making reductions and this is a very encouraging example of how, by combining our management, we have been able to protect a frontline service and offer more choice as well. We hope to can repeat this pattern when we share
services in other areas."

The majority of residents support the principle of combining services, according to a poll earlier this year. 43 per cent, of 1,500 residents who took part in a telephone survey in February, said the three authorities should share as much as possible. 34 per cent said there should be some sharing of services. Only 13% of people were opposed to sharing services.

Have your say on improving our libraries

A major consultation on improving our library provision in Hammersmith & Fulham has begun - with the aim of replicating the massive success of the brand new Shepherds Bush Library in our other town centre libraries.

The Shepherds Bush library was promoted as ‘More than a Library’ because it offers residents a variety of services under one roof and this is what the council wants to replicate in both Hammersmith and Fulham town centres.  The current libraries strategy was developed following detailed consultation with residents in March 2009 and has resulted in a nine per cent increase in the number of visits to libraries in H&F during the last year and a 12 per cent increase in resident satisfaction from 65% to 77%. As part of that consultation, library users made many suggestions for improvements and the council have already acted on their comments. For example, Askew Road Library has been redecorated, WiFi has been installed, more titles are now available and there are homework clubs for children.  

Since the new Shepherds Bush Library opened The number of new members registering has soared by 300 per cent in the first six months of opening compared to the same period at the old library and over 250,000 have already visited the building. In fact, books flew off the shelves so quickly that the council had to take the unprecedented step of placing an emergency order for 20,000 new titles! Since opening, the Workzone at Shepherds Bush Library has put forward over 300 clients for interviews and 75 have secured employment.   The unprecedented success of the new Shepherds Bush Library goes to show just what can be achieved by modernising library services. We are incredibly excited at the prospect of replicating that ‘More than a Library’ model at other locations across the borough.

However, in the current financial climate, the days of small neighbourhood libraries, such as Barons Court and Sands End, which serve relatively small numbers of people at a disproportionately high cost are coming to an end. Instead, we want to move to fewer, better state-of-the-art town centre libraries that attract more customers and are more economical to operate especially where costs can be shared with other services to customers.

The council needs to find £55 million over the next three years at the same time as we strive to cut the £133 million of remaining debt that we inherited from Labour's years of financial chaos. We are currently paying £5 million on interest payments every year before a single penny goes towards services. This transformation of library services is about offering residents the best value-for-money deal possible while balancing our books. The council is prioritising people over buildings and we simply can’t afford to run these small libraries if we are serious about tackling our financial problems.

These proposals are all about delivering more for less.  Ensuring we have the best possible libraries we can in our town centres and Askew Road - but acknowledging that in order to deliver these first rate services our smaller libraries may not be viable, especially in a borough as geographically small as Hammersmith & Fulham.

You can read about the full proposals here.  And, more importantly you can have your say on these proposals by clicking here.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Cllr Greg Smith
Cabinet Member for Residents Services