Andy Burnham’s speech to the Public Libraries Association
9 October 2008
Good morning everyone – it’s a pleasure to be here.
Culture Connects is a very appropriate title for this event, in this city, this year.
The success of Liverpool’s year as European Capital of Culture is a great example of culture bringing together individuals and communities, providing inspiration and a sense of place for everyone.
And public libraries are right at the hub of those connections – right at the heart of our cultural life. And I am delighted that the focus of this year’s conference is how libraries can harness and deploy creativity to inspire and change lives.
Later today I’ll be joining Joyce Little on a visit to the Liverpool Central Library to learn about their development plans, a key part of the legacy of 2008.
Andrew Carnegie a hundred years ago funded the establishment of 380 public libraries in Britain alone. This is what he had to say about their value:
There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the Free Public Library, this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration.
I am with him 100 per cent on that. He blazed a trail, and his model has underpinned library provision for the last 100 years.
Now, however, I feel the time is right to look again at what should define our libraries.
Take the core values and standards at the heart of Carnegie’s vision but translate them into a library service for the future. We’ve brought Victorian schools and hospitals into the 21st Century. Libraries are a similar cornerstone to our community, so it’s time to look at how we might do the same.
This is why I am delighted to be launching a modernisation review this morning that will make sure our public libraries continue fulfil that ideal for current and future generations.
The review should lead to changes. Positive changes which will reflect the best of what many of you already do, and the ambitions I know many of you hold.
I want to begin, however, by reaffirming my commitment to the provision of a comprehensive library service.
This for me is absolutely non-negotiable.
The statutory duty under the Public Libraries and Museums Act 1964 gives my department a unique and special relationship to public libraries we do not have for other cultural sectors, and I take it very seriously.
That goes back 10 years for me to when I was a special adviser in DCMS working for Chris Smith when we set up the People’s Network as what I like to think of as a step ahead of the curve in terms of addressing the digital divide.
It put internet access into every single public library in the UK and turned around the decline in the numbers of people visiting libraries.
There have been a number of assumptions made about the internet and the effect it will have on society – and my view is that some people are too fatalistic and accepting about some of the claims for the internet.
It’s ungovernable – anything goes. It’ll be the end of books and newspapers. It’ll be the death of libraries.
Actually, none of that is proving to be the case, particularly the kiss of death for libraries.
In the last five years, when the internet and broadband have taken off – library visits have gone up by 17m to 288m, with half the population using the library.
And now this year, I’d like to pay tribute to everyone who has been involved up to now with the astonishing success of the National Year of Reading. You as a sector have been leading the charge.
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The central team at the National Literacy Trust has worked tirelessly and delivered beyond all expectations, but the way the library workforce have embraced the project and made it their own has been inspiring, and you share in the credit.
The Year's library membership campaign has been one of its greatest and most tangible successes, with over 1 million new members signed up since April.
This is a phenomenal achievement and shows the public’s appetite for libraries when they are promoted with the energy and creativity that has been put into this year’s campaigning.
My basic challenge to you for the next six months is to take that level of energy and creativity and apply it to the modernisation of England’s library service.
Let’s just remind ourselves of the resources we have at our disposal.
One of my core beliefs is in the power of art and culture and sport to transform communities and transform people’s lives.
Local authorities collectively spend over a £1 billion a year on library services – that’s more than the total spent on culture and sport if you combine the grants from Arts Council England, Sport England and the museums and galleries spend by local authorities.
So we have a grand public purpose, a substantial resource, and the will of a hugely creative and talented profession.
My own vision of the future is to duplicate the renaissance in public interest and professional confidence we’ve seen in the museums and galleries sector over the past few years.
I remember hearing an art critic moaning a few years ago about the prospect of being bumped by pushchairs while contemplating great art in a gallery.
Now galleries are full of parents and children and pushchairs and I think that’s a change for the better.
But there’s still a view in some quarters that libraries are should be like the galleries of old – solemn places patrolled by formidable staff. You only have to look at recent coverage of Camden’s revised library strategy to see that.
Silence, it would appear, is a library’s most valuable asset.
But learning is not all about quiet contemplation.
I want to see libraries full of life, rather than silent and sombre. Attractive buildings, exuding a sense of joy – offering something unique and valuable right at the heart of the community.
That hasn’t, if we’re honest, always been an accurate description of some libraries.
The Library Standards were useful to kick start the early stages of the transformation process. But now we’re underway – and as the relationship between central and local government evolves – the real transformation is increasingly down to those of you on the frontline understanding what kind of service is right for your own local community.
It’s absolutely right to have responsibility for delivery at the point of delivery, bringing all services up to the level of the best.
And central government needs to change with you. We’re not in the business of micro-managing your services.
That doesn’t mean abandoning a fundamental standard of service on offer, but making sure you can provide it in the best way possible for the people you serve.
We need to help you tackle some of the big questions, about what future generations of users will require of you, and how you can work now to modernise accordingly.
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The first of these big questions is what more can libraries do to involve and engage local people in the digital age?
I’ve talked already about how libraries are surviving in the digital age. I actually think the internet is more of an opportunity than a threat.
People talk about social isolation. Young people particularly spending hours alone in front of a computer screen. But there is a real thirst out there from people looking for opportunities to come together. Libraries should be the place where real social networking happens – libraries as Facebook-3D; libraries as OurSpace instead of MySpace.
Look at the way book clubs have taken off over the last few years - getting on for 10,000 clubs with 100,000 members according to estimates by the Reading Agency.
Libraries are the natural place to meet.
Take the ‘Who Do You Think You Are’ phenomenon. Huge numbers of people are now looking to trace their family history. Libraries are already feeding this passion, and building people’s research and IT skills along the way.
What the internet offers is the chance to unleash the potential for people to get together in a library space instead of cyberspace.
Go on MySpace and find 10 or 20 other people locally interested in Spanish literature or learning the tango. Find an expert in the tango or Spanish literature who is interested in teaching a class.
Go to your local library and negotiate rooms and times and facilities. Libraries are the perfect place to provide a convenient, safe public space to bring people together.
My colleague John Denham is publishing a report today on informal adult learning that shows there’s a real hunger from the community for places where they can organise educational activities and classes for themselves.
This is a real opportunity alongside more traditional forms of educational to fire people’s imaginations and enthusiasm – bringing individuals together along with voluntary and other groups and experts, like the National Trust, and with the support of the University of the Third Age.
Indeed, I’m looking forward to seeing this kind of partnership in action at Liverpool’s Central Library later today where I’ll see highlights from the Record Office alongside the National Trust’s Chambre Hardman archive and, a personal favourite, David French’s Everton Collection.
A true celebration of local history, of local identity and, crucially, of local learning.
I believe libraries, museums and galleries are the natural home for this kind of informal learning and we want to see how we can use this outstanding network of local cultural resources to support this activity and cement a place at the heart of the community.
DIUS and my department are now working on a strategy on how best to support this, with £210m of guaranteed funding for the next three years.
I know the MLA and Society of Chief Librarians have already engaged directly with DIUS in this area and I would urge you all to follow up this opportunity.
There are implications for library staff of course – which is the second big question: what new skills and approaches do you need for the future?
The days of the librarian being seen only as the gatekeepers of knowledge are actually long gone – and you’d be the first to tell me that. The traditional professional skills are still important, but what other skills do you need to keep the transformation going?
Part of the answer is visible in that response to the National Year of Reading campaign.
Creativity and entrepreneurial skills, and great customer service are what’s needed to bring people into libraries and keep them coming back.
It’s a consistent truth that services are the most effective where local support and partnership working is strong.
We shouldn’t forget that over a third of the population don’t have computers at home.
The main chance for millions of people to get online at the moment is at their local library, and these are people – older people, the less well off and experienced – who are still looking for a level of support in an unfamiliar world, even as the Internet becomes an increasingly important part of our full participation in society.
It’s a fact of modern life as well public services have got to deliver when people are free to use them – which means opening later in the evenings and longer at weekends.
There’s no getting round that, and the best library services are already leading the way on this, but more needs to be done to bring this responsiveness to every community.
The third big question has to be about money – even more so in the current global economic situation. Where does the money come from to modernise quickly?
There’s a good example down the road in Wigan. The Platt Bridge Community Library opened two years ago as part of a LIFT project to regenerate public services in Platt Bridge and includes a new primary school, a Sure Start children’s centre with wrap around nursery care, family support centre, community health centre and a housing office.
The school contributes to the library’s stock of books, the library acts as a reception for the school. Overheads are cheaper. Visitor numbers are up on the old library a mile away that was closed as part of the project, and a wider range of people are using the library.
It’s a modern, attractive, appealing building, it’s really busy and popular and the community is clearly proud of it.
Incidentally, this illustrates a point about library closures.
It is a common understanding that local authorities close a library at their peril – but where a service has grown up piecemeal there’s always a danger it’s serving the needs of the community as it was 30 years or more ago, not how it is today.
If a library is underused it may mean it’s in the wrong place, with the wrong hours and the money can be more use reinvested elsewhere to improve the quality of the service.
We shouldn’t be afraid to take a fresh look at the library estate, if it means a better service overall.
Unfortunately, I’m not here with a pot of gold or a blank cheque.
However, I will be looking for the review to explore how easy it is for libraries to access major sources of capital like LIFT and Building Schools for the Future, and to see if and how my department can help with that.
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Shared service buildings, I think, are a really good model for a new generation of libraries.
But I’d also like to see a more proactive approach from the library sector in looking for partnerships for funding – not just sitting back waiting to be approached, but banging on the door of the Chief Executive.
Again, down the road in Manchester, the library service has been turned around in a matter of years, and is now at the heart of the authority’s vision. At the centre of this transformation has been an innovative partnership with the local FE college, which has brought investment, new library buildings, and a fresh, engaging service to the local community.
To support you in making the case, the Review will also be looking at the impact of libraries on people’s lives and how to capture the sort of evidence that wins the argument for funding with potential new partners.
To deliver the Review we will be looking to draw on the expertise, experience and creativity that already exists in the sector. Some of you are already involved, but over the next few months I hope that all of you will find the opportunity to contribute. With your support, commitment and innovative thinking I am confident that we can bring a truly modernised library offer to all our communities.
Over the past decade we’ve seen the fabric of schools and hospitals transformed by public spending. I’d like to see a similar transformation in the public library service over the next decade - co-locating with other services at the heart of the community like Sure Start and schools, GPs and other health services.
Public libraries blazed the trail of making the best things in life freely available for all. We’ve got free entry to national museums and galleries. Free swimming from next April. Free healthcare through the NHS since 1948. But we’ve had free access to ‘the medicine chest of the soul’ since the Public Libraries Act 1852.
Our public library service is a fantastic national asset and the Government is absolutely committed to ensuring we have a high-quality, free service, loved by the local community.
There is a threat – but it is not from podcasts and ebooks or the iplayer and the internet. Demand for library services isn’t diminished by the internet, it should be multiplied by it.
Margaret Hodge spotted that, and I’d like to pay tribute to the work that Margaret has done as Culture Minister in shaping the Modernisation Review, and I’m delighted to welcome Barbara Follet to the department and to have Barbara leading the review over the next six months.
The core principles of the library service, as set out in the ten-year Framework for the Future remain good and I welcome the ongoing work of the MLA which underpins everything that framework seeks to achieve.
So the threat not in what is already being done – but in not looking far enough ahead to what people in the local community will want from their local service and adapting to meet their needs and second-guess their expectations.
Libraries are an essential part of the fabric of communities and as such they should be full of life, full of joy – full of people.
Thank you.
[ENDS]
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