Library Strategy Consultation

All feedback and survey responses have been analysed.

A report on the proposed Library Strategy was considered and approved by the Council’s Cabinet on 26 July 2011. We would like to thank residents for taking part in this consultation programme.

Overview

Our library service is successful because it has constantly adapted to meet need. In these times of financial constraint, we will need to be even more innovative if we are to provide better services for less money.

To make sure we continue to meet the needs of local residents, we conducted a comprehensive review of our library service in Autumn and Winter 2010.

As part of this review we conducted an extensive public consultation. This exercise set out to invite comments and feedback from Barnet residents, library service users and non-users to help us design a new strategy for the library service.

This strategy sets clear ambitions for our library service, aiming to:

• increase reading, literacy and learning opportunities for children
• promote literacy and learning opportunities for adults
• engage with communities and offer improved community spaces and resources
• provide easy access to a wider world of knowledge and information

We propose a range of changes to deliver these aspirations – accessible and well-designed buildings, longer opening hours, buying more books, offering more resources through an online branch, using new technology, developing more learning events with partners and volunteers and providing better community spaces.

More details can be found in the summary of our strategy.

Between April and June 2011 we conducted another extensive consultation to gather your views on the new strategy. This consultation was to ensure Barnet residents, users and non users agreed with what we had included in it, give residents an opportunity to raise any concerns, highlight anything we may have missed and ensure that that the stratgey met all the needs of our diverse communities.