News from Westminster Labour

Westminster Labour makes eleventh hour plea to save St. James’s Library

Labour Councillors have issued an eleventh hour plea to Westminster Conservatives not to go ahead with the planned closure of the St James’s Library in Victoria Street on 23rd August to save £357,000.

Labour Councillors say that a petition handed in at the last Council meeting on 20th July calling on the Council to keep the library open has not yet been considered and therefore the planned library closure should not go ahead.

Earlier this year Council officers said that the “negative impact is likely to be greater on those living in and around the Old Pye Street Estate, particularly older people with mobility issues, as they will be the furthest away from alternative provision. Local schools that use the library for class visits will be at a disadvantage. In 2009/10 there were 163 class visits and 3 nursery visits to the library with library staff attending schools and nurseries on 69 occasions. A high proportion of students from Westminster City School who are a key library user are from a Black or Asian background who may be disproportionately affected.”

Councillor Paul Dimoldenberg, Leader of the Labour Group, said; “The closure of St James’s Library is a mindless act of civic vandalism and has been opposed by thousands of people who live and work in the area, many of whom have signed the petition I handed in at the last Council meeting. The Council has no mandate to go ahead with next week’s library closure.”

In addition to the closure of St James’s Library, Westminster Conservatives are:

* cutting the amount spent on new books by £250,000, a cut of 40%;

* closing the Charing Cross Road Library and moving it in with the Reference Library, off Leicester Square;

* reducing Archives, Reference and Information provision by £175,000;

* cutting library lending staffing by 4 posts to save £100,000.

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