Where can you go to reduce your fear of crime, have a massage, ring a church bell, get some information about council tax and engage in some heavy petting without being told off? Answer – a library of course.
But the latest survey on library attendances suggests the point of them is a diminishing one. Clearly people are voting with their feet because library attendances nationally are dropping.
The number of adults visiting libraries in England has fallen steadily over the last five years. In 2005, 16.4% of adults attended their local library once a month. New research indicates that the figure dropped to 12.8% last year. However, children's visits remained steady during the five-year period with around 70% using the service once a week.
Overall, 39.4% of adults surveyed said they had visited a public library at least once in the last year, compared with 48.2% in 2005.
The figures were published in a report commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sports (DCMS).
So libraries appear to be another British institution that many people love, but hardly anyone uses anymore.
And this becomes all the more crucial with the Comprehensive Spending Review coming in a couple of weeks, which will state the exact extent of the spending cuts being imposed on the public sector. We know that local government is likely to be one of the hardest areas hit and that means principal (county, borough, district and unitary) councils will have a lot less money to spend and public libraries are going to be in the firing line.
But is all lost? Not for some.
Communities in Suffolk are being given the chance to run their local library as part of a pilot scheme.
The countywide network of book loaning would remain, but groups could set local opening hours and choose events.
Suffolk County Council says grants would be provided to the groups, who would then employ the library staff.
"We want to make sure that the services are as efficient as possible and as close to the community as possible," said Guenever Pachent, Suffolk County Council's service director for culture information inclusion and learning.
The scheme is one of ten projects in the country for the government's Future Libraries Programme.
Mr Pachent says the scheme is already underway and that four groups have expressed an interest in being involved.
"We would be interested in any organisation that might want to run [a library]," she said. "There would be a minimum service that they would need to provide in exchange for a grant.
"They would need to be part of the network, so that they can circulate their books around Suffolk.
"The local parish council or other social enterprise running it would be able to make other changes themselves, so if there was room in the library they might bring in other activities.
"I think we'd set minimum opening hours, but I think people might extend opening hours."
In David Cameron’s much heralded vision of the ‘Big Society’, libraries are often held up as an area where local authorities can work with the public to maintain services in the face of shrinking resources.
But in Dorset, this approach has been successfully developing for a number of years, with local communities providing volunteers, management and even money to help protect and sustain their branch library.
As is often the case, necessity was the mother of invention. In 2006, Dorset County Council was facing a shortfall of £850,000 in its library service budget.
Initial proposals to close 13 of its 34 branch libraries were met with widespread public disapproval and eventually dropped.
To help make the savings, cuts had to be made to the book fund and the number of qualified staff, while core opening hours were reduced across all libraries. But crucially, the council also gave local communities the opportunity to add ‘extra’ hours – either by providing volunteers, trained by the council, or by paying for library staff to extend opening times. And to support this approach – self-service facilities were introduced across all libraries.
Newham has bucked the national trend. Recorded visits to its libraries have increased by 8% in just one year.
Sir Robin Wales, elected mayor of Newham, says: “Libraries impact on Newham residents’ quality of life every day through their activities and services. We make a difference by identifying new audiences while satisfying the established customer base. This is achieved through the delivery of the highest standards of facilities, services and customer care.
"We believe libraries need to be more of a one-stop experience. Rather than taking library services into pubs or supermarkets, we’re looking at bringing more services into libraries so our residents can get more of what they need from us in one place.”
Meanwhile, culture minister, Ed Vaizey MP, says: "A strong library service, based around the needs of local people, can play a key role in our ambitions to build the Big Society by providing safe and inclusive spaces for people to read, learn and access a range of community services.”
He said he wants people to think, "imaginatively, about where libraries could be".
So you there you have it. There is a future for the public library service but it is going to be run, managed and delivered in a very different style to what we are use to.
