A Campaign group have called on Hampshire County Council to re-run their controversial library consultation.
Friends of Chineham Library (FOCL) have said that the scheme, launched in January to try and save £1.76 million from the library service, was “flawed”. As previously reported, ten libraries across the county were marked for closure, which included three in the Basingstoke area: Chineham, South Ham and Odiham. It sparked outrage as councillors and residents fought for the survival of their local library. This was especially true in Chineham, the most-used library amongst the ten due to close, and the only tier two library put up for closure. Now, FOCL have said that the options provided in the consultation, which sought to find out what residents wanted the service to look like, were “narrow and biased towards a ‘quick fix'”. They also said that they failed to conduct an appropriate Equalities Impact Assessment, saying that the council “could not fully understand whether the alternative provision could be considered accessible to all groups, including the elderly or vulnerable”. The data used in the consultation came from the period where there was redevelopment ongoing in Chineham shopping centre, the group say.
The group say in their report: “HCC have described Chineham Library as ‘over-provision’. They have based this conclusion heavily on the fact that some of our residents (demographic undisclosed) were designated as non-unique users because they had (at some undisclosed time and frequency) visited an alternative library. As a result of this information, HCC concluded that all our users could switch to using this alternative library on a regular basis. We believe that HCC’s conclusions are neither well-informed, nor reasonable.”
They are calling on Hampshire County Council to “give people a real choice” about library spending, first by giving more detail on their current spending.
“We would like HCC to rank the libraries again,” the report continues, “using analysis that takes into account the spread and size of each catchment, finding a fairer way to compare unique users. If following their corrected analysis, Chineham is still found to be ranked in the bottom ten, we propose that HCC give FOCL two years to improve engagement and sustainability of Chineham library.”
Hampshire County Council did not respond to the Gazette’s request for comment.
The consultation closed on March 18, and a decision was due in June. However, because of the coronavirus crisis, HCC said that the decision would be delayed, albeit it is still expected before the end of the year.
Article originally appeared on BasingstokeGazet
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