EX LIBRIS FILM & DISCUSSION AT DEPTFORD CINEMA

Join us on Saturday 30 March at Deptford Cinema for a rare screening of EX LIBRIS, a documentary by legendary filmmaker, Frederick Wiseman. The film offers a fascinating glimpse behind the scenes of various branches of The New York Public Library. 

The screening will have an intermission, plus a discussion with library campaigners in response to themes in the film.

For more information and tickets:

http://deptfordcinema.org/new-events/2019/3/30/exlibris

Libraries and the Fight against Poverty

Libraries matter – and most of all to those who are homeless or living in poverty due to low income, debt, illness or issues with Universal Credit. For those experiencing poverty, libraries are not a luxury, but a necessity, providing essential information, access to online services and free education resources, with vital assistance from professional library staff.

From Wednesday 6 February, Downham Library will be closed for refurbishment until Thursday 28 February. Very little notice has been given to the public regarding this closure, even though many rely on its services. Some Downham Library users may have a Universal Credit claimant commitment - a specified amount of time that must be spent logged in looking for work and applying. If this is not done, they face sanctions. This could be a real issue for claimants living in Downham.

While we welcome the improvement of physical library facilities, Save Lewisham Libraries campaigners are concerned that this sudden closure, albeit temporary, will adversely affect those already living under the burden of a low income, particularly those on Universal Credit who have to undertake mandatory 'claimant commitments': specified hours that must be spent logged into the DWP's Universal Jobmatch website looking for work.

We know that library staff frequently support users, particularly those with limited digital literacy skills, to complete these mandatory tasks. During the temporary closure no extra provision for assisted access to public computers in the area appears to be available or advertised.  We are deeply concerned that this situation could lead to claimants facing benefit sanctions - this is a serious issue as there are numerous cases where such sanctions have led to loss of life.

We will be writing to Downham and Whitefoot ward councillors and Janet Daby MP to request that they write to the DWP and to Job Centres serving the area to make them aware of the situation, specifically that claimants may present at interviews with good reason for not having been able to meet their requirements during the period of the closure and that you urge them not to apply sanctions.

Any further cuts to professional staffing budgets at the three remaining council-run 'hub' libraries in Lewisham (Downham, Deptford and Lewisham Central) are likely to have a profound impact on users who are Universal Credit claimants and/or food bank users. As a recent iNews article on the realities of working in a library in the era of Universal Credit reveals: 

“People think that libraries are just there for fun. A lot of the time we’re the only places with staff that have the time to help people.  [...] People talk about cutting library services without really acknowledging we’re doing a lot to prop up services that haven’t been provided by the Jobcentre. [...] It makes me very frustrated about the Universal Credit system. I appreciate it being online but it can be so isolating for people who haven’t had that experience before. I saw the film I, Daniel Blake before I started working at the library and I thought it must be an exaggeration. But that scene, when he’s holding the mouse up to the screen and trying to control it, that’s exactly what happens on a regular basis. “It’s really difficult for libraries to quantify how much we help. In the case of [helping a benefit claimant with limited English language skills], that counts as one enquiry and one digital support service, but in reality that was making sure he didn’t get sanctioned. That was quite a big thing for his life. Maybe we had fewer visitors last year but we’ve helped more people in a more meaningful way."

Similar stories of unquantifiable social value abound in Lewisham. One Save Lewisham Libraries campaigner describes how she became motivated to fight against library cuts because of the people she met while volunteering at one of four foodbanks in Lewisham: 

“The importance of libraries for people who come to foodbanks is that – as well as being a wonderful source of books – libraries are often the only place where they can access computers and find out how to use them in order to fill in forms for benefits and make job applications. Foodbank users are often caught up in an impersonal automated system, with no-one ever available to answer telephone enquiries in person. It seems that it is only possible to provide information and process applications online and many foodbank clients have no access to computers except through their local libraries. And they often have no recourse to public funds, having recently been in prison, or are victims of domestic violence, refugees, or are homeless, or a combination of several of these severe difficulties. The professional advice and sympathetic support provided by experienced library staff to such vulnerable people is really important and incredibly helpful.”

Food bank donations at New Cross Learning

In his critical statement following a visit to the UK in 2018, Professor Philip Alston, United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, also raised the injustice of government cuts to local authority services, including libraries, because of the safety net they provide for people in poverty: 

“It thus seems patently unjust and contrary to British values that so many people are living in poverty. This is obvious to anyone who opens their eyes to see the immense growth in foodbanks and the queues waiting outside them, the people sleeping rough in the streets, the growth of homelessness, the sense of deep despair that leads even the Government to appoint a Minister for suicide prevention and civil society to report in depth on unheard of levels of loneliness and isolation. And local authorities, especially in England, which perform vital roles in providing a real social safety net have been gutted by a series of government policies. Libraries have closed in record numbers, community and youth centres have been shrunk and underfunded, public spaces and buildings including parks and recreation centres have been sold off.”

Cuts to library services hurt us all, but hit homeless people the hardest is described by a library worker writing anonymously in The Guardian: 

"For many homeless people, the library is a sanctuary. The computers provide a way to stay connected to loved ones, and access to information on jobs, benefits and housing. The books and newspapers provide solace, information and entertainment. And it is a place of safety – something most homeless shelter residents spend their days searching for. I had assumed that the local park was the most obvious public space, but one regular library visitor explained that it was lonely and unsafe out there. The library was the only public place with staff to keep the space safe."

Libraries cannot solve the problem of poverty, but they can give critical assistance to those in desperate need, by providing information about where to get specific support, access to computers and support with digital skills, and a warm safe place for people of all ages and backgrounds. Library closures or reductions in trained library staff have far-reaching, long-term consequences for society – but those experiencing extreme poverty, the consequences are immediate and devastating.


Join our campaign to stop further devastation to Lewisham Library Services. 

Our next meeting is on Tuesday 12th February, 7-9pm, at the Amersham Arms pub, 388 New Cross Rd, SE14 6TY.  https://www.facebook.com/events/397039014196452/

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https://www.trusselltrust.org/get-help/find-a-foodbank/lewisham/

Lewisham Foodbank

MAIN LOCATION
Hope Centre
Malham Road
Forest Hill
London SE23 1AN

(open Wednesdays 10 am - 12 noon and
Fridays 12 noon - 2 pm) 

PHONE

07938 071854

info@lewisham.foodbank.org.uk

CAMPAIGN MEETING 12 FEB 2019

You are welcome to join us at our next meeting

SAVE LEWISHAM LIBRARIES CAMPAIGN 

7-9pm Tuesday 12 FEBRUARY 2019

Amersham Arms

388 New Cross Road 

London SE14 6TY

https://www.facebook.com/events/397039014196452/

We look forward to planning our next month of campaign actions. 

Open to all. 

Campaign Meeting 7.30pm Monday 14 JAN 2019

Happy New Year to you all!

There is a campaign meeting tonight at 7.30pm Monday 14th January 2019

Please note we are trying out a new venue for our meeting... 

Suttons' Radio 139-141 Lewisham High St, London SE13 6AA

https://suttonsradio.com/map/

Please join us to plan for the campaign in 2019. 
Hope to see you all very soon!

#SaveLewLibs in the news

Check out our latest news coverage in the local press. 

Cutting libraries in Lewisham ‘a false economy’ comments SSL representative Dr Alice Corble
South London Press, 7 December 2018

Save Lewisham Libraries campaign wants answers on possible rebuild
News Shopper, 25 November 2018

Cuts to Lewisham libraries put on ice after council faces opposition
East London Lines, 23 November 2018

Campaigners fighting to prevent £450,000 cuts to Lewisham’s struggling library services East London Lines, 18 October 2018

Christmas Social & Meeting 5th December

Our next meeting will be on Wednesday 5th December at the Catford Constitutional Club at 7pm. The meeting will be fairly brief and will be followed by a Christmas social! 

Please join us to celebrate our successes so far and plan for the future. Feel free to bring friends/family and anyone else who might be interested in the campaign. 

It’s been a hectic couple of months, so we are really looking forward to a more relaxed evening and a chance to catch up with everyone.

Hope to see you all very soon!

The campaign has recently been featured in local news here and here.   

Campaign Press Release 23 November 2018

After several weeks of vigorous campaigning, the Save Lewisham Libraries Campaign group (SLL) welcomes the council’s recent decision to suspend library service cuts, pending a feasibility study into an alternative proposal of re-developing Lewisham Library. We thank Lewisham Mayor, Cabinet and Councillors for listening to our concerns and acting on them. We posed a number of questions at the Mayor and Cabinet meeting on 21 November 2018 and are grateful for a prompt response published the following day, which addresses some of these questions.

However, many of our questions and concerns raised have not been fully answered, but rather deferred to the outcome of the feasibility study due to be completed in April 2019. Whilst we appreciate that some answers will not be possible to give until the study is complete, there are some guarantees that SLL will continue to seek, thereby holding Lewisham Mayor, Councillors and Officers to account on issues that are a matter of public interest to constituents and library stakeholders.

In particular, in response to our question regarding potential reduction in staffing levels during the temporary relocation, the Council has responded: ‘We will be looking at the staffing levels required as part of the feasibility work. Our ambition is to ensure that any temporary library is staffed for as many hours as the current Lewisham Library.’ The campaign would like to reiterate that library staff should be valued as an integral part and indispensable asset of the new service and building development, and should be treated as such, both in consultation and continued service delivery in the transition period.

In response to SLL campaigners’ presentation at the Mayor and Cabinet meeting, Cllr Slater (Cabinet Member for Libraries) stated that “we agree that we all support a strong, innovative library service” and on inviting our representatives to speak, Mayor Egan acknowledged that “library staff and library campaigners are the experts”. We are glad this has been recognised, and it is our collective expert opinion that the Council will not be able to fulfil its statutory duties, nor its municipal and professional service missions, without the current library staff teams. 

We therefore call for the current number of posts to be ring-fenced, as we believe that this is the only way that Lewisham library service can operate within its statutory requirements. Any reduction in staffing levels will be robustly challenged by the campaign.

We still have grave concerns for the safe storage and continued public access to the archive and local history collections. Whilst we understand the council will look for “safe storage of Lewisham’s archives” as part of the feasibility study, this response does not state whether the library and information service will allow continued access to the archives through any potential redevelopment. Can the council guarantee it will fulfil its public interest duties in safeguarding and enabling public access to these collections with the newly proposed plans?

Finally, we understand that the initial focus of the feasibility study will be on financial viability, and we welcome the fact that the council have confirmed that they will not consider the freehold sale of the current Lewisham Library land to a private developer. However, in terms of consultation within the feasibility study, the Mayor has publicly stated at the meeting on 21st November that it “is really important that those conversations are had with staff and with library campaigners so we will ask that that is as transparent as it can be”. We will work with Councillors and Officers to ensure this commitment to transparent dialogue is held to.

We look forward to being part of these conversations that inform the complete feasibility study in April 2019 and will keep the wider publics of Lewisham and beyond informed on this process.

Our next campaign meeting will be in a couple of weeks - details to follow. Thank you and solidarity to everyone who has supported us so far.