Brent Council seeks to pull wool over Secretary of State’s eyes on library figures

Councillor Paul Lorber, Brent Liberal Democrat Leader, has challenged the Brent library figures on which the Secretary of State for Culture relied when deciding not to order an inquiry into Brent Council’s library closures.

According to a letter [PDF] sent to Brent SOS libraries campaign by government lawyers, the Secretary of State doesn’t need to intervene because:

Brent Council have confirmed that the figures they hold for library visit numbers for December 2011 and January 2012 show substantial increases in visits to the six remaining libraries – as compared with figures for the same months for the previous year.

However figures uncovered by Councillor Lorber show that overall library usage has dropped by nearly 20,000 visits a month. It is not clear whether Brent Council shared these figures with the government before the Secretary of State made his decision.

Councillor Lorber has written to the Secretary of State setting out his concerns about the evidence used by the Secretary of State to justify his decision.

He said:

The Secretary of State is relying on flawed evidence to justify his reluctance to get involved. Brent Council appears to be trying to pull the wool over his eyes by claiming that library usage in Brent has increased.

Tragically the facts show otherwise. Since Labour closed half of our local libraries far fewer local residents are visiting, studying and enjoying their local library service.

Councillor Lorber has also expressed concern that the Secretary of State quotes Brent Council’s claim that opening hours at some libraries have increased while failing to take into account thefact that overall opening hours have decreased from 544 hours per week to 349 hours a week (8 hours of which are unstaffed).

You can read a copy of Councillor Lorber’s letter to the Secretary of State here Letter to Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt MP – February 2012 [PDF].