Tadley library opening hours cut

Tadley library to close on Friday evenings from April due to budget cuts

TADLEY Library is to close on Friday evenings from April, as part of a move to slash thousands of pounds from Hampshire County Council's libraries budget.

Last Friday (January 20), the county council decided to make an overall 5.8 per cent (112-hour) reduction in library opening hours each year across the county.

This, coupled with a reduction of 17.3 full-time equivalent (FTE) jobs, is expected to save the council £446,000 from its library and information services budget – which is in addition to savings of £2.48m made over the past two years.

The county council originally also proposed closing Tadley Library on Tuesday mornings but, following customer feedback, the 9.30am to 1pm Tuesday opening has been retained.

From April, Tadley Library will only be open from 9.30am to 5pm on Fridays, rather than its current hours of from 9.30am to 7pm.

The library's Wednesday late-night opening hours, from 9.30am to 7pm, remain unchanged, as do the Saturday opening hours, of 9.30am to 4pm.

According to the council, issue figures indicate that the library is relatively busy on Saturday afternoon, with 23 borrowers each hour before 1pm, and 18 borrowers each hour after 1pm.

Kingsclere Library, which is located in Kingsclere Village Club, George Street, remains unaffected by the cuts.

The full-time equivalent job reductions in libraries countywide currently include the loss of 10.8 library assistant posts, 3.4 caretaker posts, and the loss of 3.1 jobs among other library staff.

Hampshire's Library and Information Service currently has a total of 12.9 FTE library assistant vacancies.

According to the council, this means that some of the library staff affected by the job cuts can be absorbed by the vacant positions, although some may have to work at more than one library to maintain the same number of hours they work.

A three-month consultation on proposals for libary cuts across the county ran from September 29 to December 28 last year, with more than 5,500 responses from the public, staff and local councils.

The county council's executive member for culture and recreation, Keith Chapman (Con, Calleva and Kingsclere), said that although it had not been possible to meet everyone's requests following the consultation, they had hopefully met the majority.

“It is a tough decision to reduce hours and staff numbers, but after two years of modernising the service, this was our last option,” said Mr Chapman.

For more information about the consultation and cuts, visit www. hants.gov.uk/library.