Cheshire East will make ‘substantial savings’ by reducing library opening times, but offering more services could see normal hours restored in the future, a councillor said.
The proposal to reduce the opening hours and to close on Saturdays met with an angry response from the public during the consultation period.
As a result the proposal to close on Saturdays was dropped.
At Wednesday’s meeting of the full council, when the budget was approved, Cllr Mick Warren, chair of the environment and communities committee, said: “By reducing the opening hours in our libraries we will be able to make substantial savings in this year’s budget and help balance the MTFS (mid-term financial strategy 2023-7).
“This proposal, however, I hope will be a temporary measure brought about by the current financial pressures we find ourselves in.
“I want to see this council in future years make greater use of our libraries by locating frontline services into the buildings as other authorities have successfully done.”
He said pre-Covid there were 1.4 million library visits a year, and numbers were starting to get back towards pre-pandemic levels.
“Apart from issuing books, [the libraries] already process blue badges, bus pass applications, take council payments, undertake DBS checks for taxi drivers, verify evidence for benefit applicants, take homeless enquiries and, of course, signpost residents to other sources of help,” he said.
“By increasing our offer of services in libraries in future years, I believe this will enable them to return to full-time hours as has happened in other authorities.”
He stressed the council was not closing any libraries, as other local authorities had done.
Cheshire East had to make cuts and savings to balance its books this year as it faced a £20 million funding gap, despite increasing council by 4.99%.
(Nantwich Library by Google Maps)
Why don’t “they” introduce Car Parking charges across the whole administrative area. Has anyone calculated the effect of the increased charges?
Hi JD,
Unfortunately that would have made sense, so that was obviously dismissed at the first round of planning, sorry to say but with this lot in charge your on your own,but they would like you to pay more for less services.
Cheshire East need to show compassion to their residents, after all we each contribute to their sallies , pensions and well being, Surely given the financial challenges people face Cheshire East could have been more empathetic and consider longer opening hours or at least no change. They could have offered a warm environment for those struggling with heating costs they could have used thie situation as an opportunity to offer supportive advice they could help build a safer environment. My question why have not done ths