Status Anxiety: Reading between the lines

On Tuesday I received an invitation from the Women’s Institute asking me if I’d be prepared to participate in a debate at their annual general meeting in Liverpool on 8 June. They want me to speak ‘in opposition to a motion urging central government to maintain support for local libraries’.

You have to take your hat off to the Labour party spin machine. It has successfully propagated the myth that the government is directly responsible for the closure of local libraries. In my reply to the WI, I said I’d be delighted to speak in its debate but pointed out it was a bit nonsensical to urge the government to continue to do something it’s never actually done. Isn’t the WI aware that councils are responsible for the upkeep of libraries? Evidently not. Take the Kensal Rise Library in Queen’s Park. This fine public institution, which was opened by Mark Twain in 1900, is one of six libraries in the London Borough of Brent that’s been earmarked for closure. Needless to say, the Labour-controlled council blames these closures entirely on ‘the cuts’, claiming it has no choice but to shut down these much-loved libraries, given the amount by which the Department for Communities and Local Government has slashed its budget. ‘Don’t blame us,’ is the message coming out of the town hall. ‘Blame Eric Pickles.’

Clearly, this is yet another instance of a Labour council choosing to cut public services for purely political reasons. This cynical ploy is particularly inexcusable in the case of the Kensal Rise Library because there’s a well-organised group of local volunteers in Queen’s Park who’ve offered to take it over.

As part of its ‘consultation’ over the future of this and the five other libraries in the borough threatened with closure, Brent Council invited various local groups to submit proposals as to how they might be saved.