A protest calling for the re-opening of Sallynoggin public library will take place today at 5pm outside the April meeting of Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown Co Council. This follows the decision to of the Council to close the library just before the Easter break.
It also follows the recent announcement by the Impact union that represents the library staff in the Council that they will not co-operate with the Council’s plan to establish a volunteer-run book service in Sallynoggin as a substitute for a library run by trained librarians.
Cllr Richard Boyd Barrett and Hugh Lewis of the People Before Profit Alliance will attempt to raise the issue with an emergency motion calling for the re-instatement of the library.
Local residents and campaigners have held a number of protests over recent weeks in an effort to prevent the closure and large numbers have signed a petition.
Prominent local figures such as Maeve Binchy, Christy Moore, Kirsten Sheridan, Conor Mc Pherson and Vincent Browne have also signed a statement calling for the library to be retained.
The protesters are calling for an exemption to the government’s public sector recruitment ban which has led to 21% decline in staff numbers in the County’s library service.
They are also calling on the Council itself to review its decision to single out Sallynoggin library to bear the brunt of staff shortages rather than spreading the effects across all libraries in the county and thus preventing any library closures.
Cllr Richard Boyd Barrett, of the People before Profit Alliance said:
“The closure before Easter of the Sallynoggin library is an absolute disgrace. It is a body blow to an area like Sallynoggin that already suffers considerable disadvantage and has been further hit by the unemployment crisis.
Fianna Fail and the Greens should hang their heads in shame for imposing cuts on services that are vital for vulnerable communities. It makes a sick joke of all the government talk of developing a “knowledge economy” to aid economic recovery if at the same time they allow the closure of libraries which are so vital for education and learning.
It is particularly ironic that we should now have the Minister for Culture, Mary Hanafin, the Minister for Children, Barry Andrews, and a third Minister, Ciaran Cuffe, in this constituency and none of them are doing anything to stop this disgraceful library closure.
We are calling on the government to, at the very least, allow an exemption to the recruitment ban where it is affecting vital frontline services such as libraries.
However, our demands are also directed at the Council itself which is controlled by Fine Gael and the Labour Party. It is a scandal that they voted for a budget which explicitly singled out Sallynoggin library to bear the brunt of the cut-backs and staff shortages when there were alternatives that could have prevented any library closures.
There seems to be an attitude that a working class area is somehow less deserving of a library than other areas.
There is also a clear link between the closure of Sallynoggin library and Council plans to build a new €20 million super-library in Moran’s Park in Dun Loaghaire. It is increasingly obvious that the Council’s plan is to close a number of the smaller branch libraries over the coming period and centralise library services in the new library HQ. This is a stupid and short-sighted strategy. Proximity to library services is a key factor in encouraging their use, particularly for young people, pensioners and those on low incomes. Closing down local libraries will reduce overall usage and will particularly badly affect less-well off communities. We don’t need trophy buildings we need library services that are part of every community.
So we will be calling tonight on the Council and the Fine Gael, Labour majority to reverse this utterly misguided decision.”
For more info/confirmation: Richard Boyd Barrett 086-7814520