EIGHT libraries in Hampshire are set to close at the end of the year, and Andover library could have its opening hours cut by as much as 39 per cent.

These are the results of a consultation on the county council's library service, which aims to save £1.76 million.

Residents and library users across Hampshire were asked to have their say on two proposals, one of which would have seen ten libraries close and the other all remain open, but with significant opening hours cuts.

From the responses, Hampshire County Council have come up with a compromise solution - eight libraries are to close and all remaining HCC-run sites will have their hours cut by an average of 20 per cent.

The new opening hours for all county sites, including Andover, will be decided in a short consultation to be held next month.

South Ham library in Basingstoke and Deane is among those libraries to close, whilst Chineham library had originally been on the shortlist but was removed after a rousing response saw the community unite.

Councillor Sean Woodward, HCC's executive member for recreation and heritage, said: “I would like to thank all the people who took the time to respond to our consultation – more than 21,000 people shared their views. It is clear that library services are close to people’s hearts; and it was encouraging that so many people recognise the challenges faced by libraries and want to bring their ideas to the table. I will be looking very closely at this feedback alongside the evidence, as I consider the recommendations later this month.

“Over 70 per cent of respondents agreed with the need for the Library Service to adapt to meet the changing demands placed on it. Proposals to deliver efficiencies, generate additional income and explore different ways of delivering library services all received high levels of support, and I am keen to explore these areas to the absolute maximum as we start to shape the service for the future.

“Our proposals in the public consultation explained that £1.76 million must be saved from the library budget. This is in line with savings that all County Council services must make, to bridge the funding gap faced by local authorities everywhere as demands for services rise, particularly in social care. When you add almost £110 million of unplanned costs and losses to the County Council this financial year, due to Coronavirus, it becomes even more essential that any decisions made now put the Library Service in the best possible position to meet future challenges.”

There had been 21,200 responses to the official consultation, whilst another 5,400 signed petitions and 1,400 attended meetings, making it the best responded to consultation in HCC history.

Of those, 70 per cent said that the service needs to adapt. 21 per cent preferred the option where ten libraries would close, with 58 per cent instead opting for a reduction in operating hours alone.

However, council officials were unconvinced that the preferred option would be able to make the required amount of savings, and so opted for a compromise solution. The remaining eight libraries on the closure list account for less than five per cent of the issues of books and less than five per cent of visits.

Hampshire's libraries are already open for shorter hours than usual because of the coronavirus crisis, and they will transition from these reduced hours to the new operating hours over the course of the next two months.

Timeline:

  • July & August 2020: Libraries to transition to new operating hours
  • August 2020: Short consultation to be held to ask the public what the new opening hours should be for their library.
  • September 2020: Staff consultation to be held on 40-50 FTE (out of 400 members of staff) redundancies.
  • January 1, 2021: Majority of the eight libraries to close.
  • April 1, 2021: Community libraries will have their financial support from HCC withdrawn.

Officers also said that their planned increase in income has been postponed.

HCC were hoping to make more money from their library services over the next years in order to help save the £1.76m, but because of the Covid-19 crisis, this is not feasible.

Instead, slightly more is to be saved from the operations budget - £1.115m instead of £1.04m.

Of this, £340,000 is to be made from the eight closures, whilst £775,000 will be generated from a reduction in opening hours.

£240,000 of savings was made in 2019-2020, which will be enhanced with £210,000 in savings from 2020-21.

Additionally, £49,000 will be saved from the cessation of support from Tier 4 libraries, whilst £146,000 will be made in efficiencies, such as staff redundancies.