Judith --

Over 1,600 people joined together to sign the Open Letter to the Chancellor about libraries. In preparation for the Spending Round announcement, CILIP developed a range of ‘asks’ of Government, which we have been sharing with Parliamentarians as part of our wider lobby for libraries. These included:

• Fair and sustainable funding to the Devolved Nations to ensure that devolved powers are matched by greater fiscal autonomy and sufficient resources;
• Increased funding to Health Education England (HEE) to implement the findings of the independent Topol Review, including increasing the library and knowledge specialist workforce;
• Increased financial support to Local Government, supporting the Local Government Association call for a fair and sustainable funding settlement;
• A long-term improvement in funding to schools, colleges and Universities, enabling learning providers to invest in their library and information professional workforce;
• Improve funding and policy for prisons, ensuring that they address prisoner education through libraries alongside the traditional ‘crime and punishment’ agenda of Government.

I have written up a full analysis at "The Chancellor’s 2019 Spending Round – What does it mean for libraries and where do we go from here?" and invite your comments and reactions. 

We wrote to the Open Letter to the Chancellor earlier this week specifically calling on him to recognise the power and impact of local public libraries. This was a tremendous collective cry for long-term sustainable investment in libraries, and has enabled us to more than double the number of people registered to support libraries through our new platform.

Please help continue the momentum for libraries. Forward this email to interested colleagues and friends and invite them to sign up on Libraries Deliver. We will see stronger when we stand together and are organized. 

Sincerely,

Nick Poole

Chief Executive, CILIP

Libraries Deliver
http://www.librariesdeliver.uk/