Nottingham City Council’s plan to hand the running of three libraries over to voluntary groups followed an ‘explosive’ Labour Group meeting.
The Labour-run council is looking to cut £1.5m from its libraries service over the next two years in a bid to become more financially sustainable.
To do this, it had proposed to shut the Basford, Bilborough, Radford-Lenton and Aspley libraries, alongside the axing of jobs and a reduction in opening hours across other facilities, including Central Library.
However, the council said it would look at alternatives to the closure of the facilities following a consultation last year, which received more than 5,000 responses.
Cllr Ethan Radford (Lab), deputy leader of the council, said the administration has decided to continue to run Radford-Lenton Library.
But it will now act as a centralised stock hub, with a scaled-down library service.
The remaining three libraries will be leased to voluntary organisations to take on management and upkeep of the facilities.
“A number of groups have expressed expressions of interest and submitted some workable plans,” he said.
“We are currently in negotiation with some of them about going to the next step to finalise the arrangement.
“It puts us in a position where we can rely on the strength of our voluntary organisations in the city. They do a lot of incredibly good work, and to work in community partnership with them to continue to provide services for residents is a priority.”
A Labour Group meeting was held at Loxley House on the evening of Thursday (January 16), during which some councillors attempted to table a motion to keep all libraries council-run.
One Labour councillor, who attended the private meeting but asked to remain anonymous, said the motion failed to pass after the interim chief finance officer said it would not be affordable.
They said an “explosive” debate that followed led to a number of councillors leaving the building in protest.
The councillor added they had been left concerned and worried to attend future Labour Group meetings due to the atmosphere on the night.
When the tone of the meeting was put to Cllr Radford, he said: “Libraries are always an emotive issue for people, but the priority here has to be and will be making sure the doors stay open.”
Under the plans, the council will retain ownership of the buildings, but some staff cuts will take place. The number of staff affected is not yet known.
“There will be reductions in staff, the majority of which will be deletions of vacancies,” Cllr Radford said.
“The ultimate fact here is 95 per cent of the feedback from the consultation was to keep the libraries open in some form or other. The proposal achieves that by working with our voluntary organisations.
“The leader, Cllr Neghat Khan, has made a very clear commitment once we have made this £1.5m saving, we will not be returning to the libraries service.”
Local libraries campaigner Des Conway said he is “very disappointed with this outcome, and the nightmare scenario of different service delivery models across the city.”
He added: “I know that in the past Save Nottingham Libraries issued a statement last time this was a prospect, defending the in-house service delivery model, and that is also the view of Save Our Services (SOS).”
Cllr Neghat Khan, leader of the council, added: “Though the council is reducing services, we are trying to keep all library buildings open and may even be expanding services through our community partnerships in the voluntary sector.
“These voluntary organisations would have access to funding the council doesn’t, which could be used to repair, improve and maintain these buildings, as well as the potential to increase and broaden services currently on offer.”
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