Drama escalates on libraries takeover as conflicting claims made by Suffolk County Council and Suffolk Libraries

Drama is escalating over the council takeover of Suffolk's libraries as the organisations involved shared conflicting accounts.

Suffolk County Council announced on Monday it intended to take control of the library service for the first time since 2012, when it was surrendered to the Suffolk Libraries charity due to austerity cuts.

Cllr Philip Faircloth-Mutton, the lead for environment, communities and equality, said bringing libraries in-house was 'the right thing to do'.

But Bruce Leeke, the CEO of Suffolk Libraries, said the charity had been left 'incredibly shocked, disappointed and frustrated' after only being given a 15-minute notice before the move was made public.

Reduced services

The county council said its takeover would guarantee all 45 sites across Suffolk remained open and kept their current opening hours.

Suffolk Libraries said although closing any of the sites was never in question, reducing the opening hours was the only viable option to meet rising costs and ensure the long-term future of the service.

The charity stressed even if opening hours were kept the same, should the council take over the service, its offer could still be reduced.

This is because contracts being run with other bodies would not transfer over to the county council — some of the outgoing services could be the long-term arts program, prison libraries and literacy projects.

Addressing this, the council said it would apply to the same grants to keep non-core library services open, with the potential some contracts could be replaced.

Other ongoing services, it said, could continue as they had already been paid for, while the council planned to bring new ones.

On prison libraries specifically, the council said the charity had assured the service, operated by the Ministry of Justice, was separate from their contract, meaning the service could carry on.

'Serious concerns' over wages

Part of the county council's reasoning behind taking over the service after more than a decade was due to 'serious concerns' about the viability of the charity.

SCC revealed Suffolk Libraries spent a third of its annual bill on its head office, including senior managers.

But Suffolk Libraries stated all the management costs were paid either through external funding or money generated by the charity — instead stating these were less than 5 per cent.

The county council said the data it had been provided verified their initial claim, stressed management costs were 'too high' and accused the charity of putting 'library closures before savings and efficiency' — closures were never planned, according to the charity.

Suffolk Libraries said pay scales would need to be rebalanced under SCC control and, along with higher employer contributions on national insurance, would result in a bigger pay bill — this, the authority confirmed, had already been factored in.

The county council promised it would protect frontline staff roles but said it was fair to assume some others would go.

Suffolk Libraries called claims over staff wages 'particularly misleading' and claimed the takeover was made to avoid changes which could impact the mayoral chances of the administration's candidates during devolution elections — the authority said this was 'nonsense'.

Apart from the extra staff bill, the charity said there would be other substantial additional costs — as high as £1 million in the first year.

Although the council confirmed this claim and went on to say the first year costs could go up to £1.8 million, due to adjustments to senior and back-office staffing levels, it stressed these had already been factored in.

This would include, for instance, the £500,000 in business rate relief gap due to the loss of the charity status, for which the authority said investigations were ongoing as part of the local government reorganisation review.

Broken down negotiations

There are vastly different accounts of how negotiations between the two progressed and ultimately broke down, both during the official tender process and the direct award discussions.

Ultimately, the council says it could not accept the charity's demands, which included the reduction in operating hours, unwillingness to consider reduction in its back-office and management costs, and breaking procurement law by asking for a longer contract.

On the charity's side, it says the council has failed to understand what today's library service has to offer, stressing its proposals ensured its viability into the future.

What now?

There has been no indication of any changes to what the county council has already announced, meaning the takeover will be subject to a vote during the March 18 cabinet meeting.

In the meantime, a petition calling for the decision to be reconsidered has already attracted nearly 4,500 signatures.