Scores of families held a protest about the proposed closure of Westdene Library before a public meeting where Brighton and Hove City Council’s money-saving plan was discussed.
Westdene Library, in Bankside, is one of three libraries facing closure as part of the council’s “library sustainability plan”.
The meeting, at Westdene Primary School on Tuesday (7 October), was the last of nine held since July to discuss the proposals which also include closing Hollingbury and Rottingdean libraries.
The council also plans to cut the hours at its two biggest libraries – reducing the opening times at the Jubilee Library, Brighton, by two hours on Monday evenings and three hours on Sunday afternoons.
At the Hove Carnegie Library, the council plans to reduce the opening times by two hours on Wednesday evenings and three hours on Saturday afternoons.
The aim is to save £250,000 from the council’s annual £3.7 million libraries budget over two years – or £125,000 a year. The closure of Westdene Library would save £10,000 a year.
The council is also paying off a 25-year private finance initiative (PFI) agreement for the cost of building and running the Jubilee Library.
The PFI deal started in 2004 and expires in November 2029 and, at the end of March this year, the council owed almost £15.7 million.
A report to the council’s cabinet in July said that Westdene had the second-lowest number of visits out of all the libraries in Brighton and Hove.
But the library is only staffed for one day a week, on a Tuesday. Two thirds of the 10,039 visitors in 2024-25 came through Libraries Extra which gives the public access when the site is not staffed.
A petition to save Westdene Library on the Change.org website had more than 1,700 signatures at the time of writing.
Petition organiser Marisa Hartley-Brown said that the library was a rare community space in Westdene.
She said: “We don’t have any kind of social facilities, not even a pub in Westdene, and that’s something the council is missing.
“When they make these decisions, they’re looking at very specific criteria with these closures. They’ve picked on areas that they know aren’t Labour voters and that’s why they chose Westdene.”
Conservative councillor Ivan Lyons, who represents Westdene and Hove Park ward, said that the £20,000 saving made by closing the library was “minuscule”.
Councillor Lyons said: “The next library is two or three miles away. There’s no public transport.
“If they close the library down here, then people will not be able to access computers and books – and there’s the primary school next door. What message is that sending out?”
More than 2,400 people have responded to the consultation on the council’s website.
Labour councillor Alan Robins, the council’s cabinet member for sport, recreation and libraries, said: “We’ve been really pleased that so many residents have already engaged with the consultation through the online survey and our public meetings, including the one last night discussing Westdene Library.
“We are aware of the strong local feeling and also met with library customers in Westdene Library earlier in the summer to learn more about how the proposed closure would impact them and their use of the library service.
“We’ve been engaging with residents and community groups across the city to discuss potential alternative provision of some services, including conversations with Westdene School.
“We hope to continue these conversations and explore any ideas that come from the communities affected while enabling us to achieve the savings necessary to balance our budget.
“We’re encouraging people to have their say on our proposals by completing the online survey before it closes on Friday (10 October) so everyone’s feedback can be taken into account before a final decision is made.”
To take part in the consultation, click here.
Perhaps if BHCC were not quietly squandering £63.7million trying to impose an unwanted digital system on residents who want staff back in their offices providing proper customer services.
https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/notice/0056d2a9-25ce-4af2-8522-82a7564a1007?origin=SearchResults&p=3
Plus another £1.3million on nine separate contracts for ‘digital bootcamps’ to train staff on these digital systems to design residents out, they might have more money to spend on public Libraries and parks.
Digital discrimination is more important.
Again, irrelevant, it’s a different budget that couldn’t be used for this and vice versa, and it is a requirement to do that work, Elaine.
Umm, I think you will find the contract is £637k not £63 million
Westdene and Whitehawk don’t have a Pub, but Whitehawk has some good Services-even a Library.
Surely you can’t take that away from the Younger Generation who don’t even have a Phone-and this the Genaration that your encouraging not to have Phones, so get them out playing in the Park, in the Local Community ( Library,)
There isn’t anything is there other than a Primary School-that’s like being in the middle of know where, yet within The City.
Council get 33 million on Folks that Pay Parking Tickets.
Whitehawk is also at the start of a transformational period too.
Just shocking. Libraries are foundational to our civilisation. The removal of one to save £10k is cultural vandalism and sacrilege. Who knew this Labour government would be the ones to drive a wrecking ball through our youths prospects like this! Shutting schools& libraries what a legacy. When you balance this saving against their huge splurges on ill informed pet projects & gold plated pensions which our council tax is ever rising to meet, this decision is sickening.
I agree, minimal savings for a reduced access to literature is not right, especially when there are very obvious ways to explore to keep this running.
The white elephant here is the Jubilee Library. Huge amounts of funding is spent upon this overly large building in upkeep, which has a lot of empty space, which needs security staff employed to tackle problems of anti social behaviour from random people who drop in without intention of using library services. This is draining the income from Jubilee.
Every time I pop in there, 90% of the seating and almost 100% of computers are taken up with university students, who have their own facilities at the universities, albeit a few of these are college students who need them. Large study areas are solely for these people, and some of us were excluded from using these spaces within the library, last time I went down, as the security guard said only the students can use those particular tables and areas, even though they were empty at the time. Local residents are not getting a look in at Jubilee unless they wait hours for computers and seats.
There is a huge empty space covering most of the building and it is very expensive to run. Jubilee has far greater opening hours than the local libraries so a cut here is the first necessity. Apart from if you need rare books or special services, Jubilee mainly serves the transient population and students and visitors, as most indigenous people are housed on the outskirts of town.
Card access would cut down the need for so much security here. The inner city library is draining the resources from the rest of the city.
The children’s section does run very efficiently though, and a lot of children use the services.
On the other hand, the small local libraries are vital to the indigenous residents of the city. Many people do not pop into town for libraries as travel is expensive and it takes an hour to get into the city these days, and some locations do not have easy or frequent bus services.
Local libraries serve the majority of the indigenous populations, who generally live on the urban fringes of the city. Local libraries form the heart of community cohesion, well being, meeting friends and allowing the elderly and disabled easy access to them and keeping them more active, especially in the winter months when they need a warm local space, and when long bus journeys are more difficult for some if having to go into town for library services. There are few community areas on the city outskirts whereas central Brighton is well served, so the community aspect of Jubilee is less imperative than it is in areas of few services where the local libraries play such a huge part.
Local libraries serve as community centres, refuges and meeting places, especially in winter months, form part of very few services available on local estates, and play a large part in connecting to local schoolchildren and educating local children. Families mainly live on the outskirts of the city, so they need library provision near where they live. Local libraries form the heart of communities whilst the Jubilee is a heartless and soulless place in my experience of being there, as it is too big and faceless without any character. Jubilee Library can shrink into a smaller space and hire out the extra rooms.
We must preserve and continue to operate all the local libraries which cost a drop in the ocean compared to what it costs to run Jubilee Library in particular. The council has a duty to its permanent citizens and taxpayers, to maintain all local libraries or risk our indigenous populations of children reading a lot less if facilities are not nearby on the outskirts of the city, where most of them live. The knock on effect will be lower school performances in literacy and many children will not know the love of reading books and the excitement of getting a new one regularly from their local library.
To serve the full time local residents, it is necessary not to cut back any services in all the local libraries, but to cut the opening times of Jubilee Library, and to use some of the wasted space in Jubilee to hire out to other companies for rental. Such a huge empty space in the middle of that building. It only needs to be half as big.
Cut back the security to a minimum and use a door entry system at Jubilee Library, so that everyone just popping in to cause trouble will have to go through a registering gate with a card. This will cut down those who cause trouble and come in randomly as I have seen there.
There is still a large entrance lobby where anyone can come in and rest their legs for a while without going through a security entrance into the library itself. Day visitors can register at the entrance and use the cafe etc.
If cutting local libraries takes place it will come back to haunt the council, and it will become an example nationally of mismanagement, and cutting literacy levels of the indigenous children of the city.
Share the services across the city so that each person has equal access to library services locally within a short distance of where they live.
Agreed. The big mystery is why Public Works Loans Board money was not borrowed to erect the Jubilee if a new city centre library was necessary in the first place in a location with no bus stops or convenient disabled parking. Why did the council go for a ruinous PFI contract hoovering up half the libraries budget for 30 years and serving as an excuse to close other city libraries? Yet PWLB money was borrowed no problem for the private enterprise and other white elephant, the i360.
Honestly, Community Ownership seems the way forward here. With plenty of people out to demonstrate, they should have enough hands on deck to make that easily happen.
😂 Most of those people were kids!
Get out of school – get to work 4 year olds!
It’s a rich learning environment, lol. No, but seriously, doesn’t take an army to make community ownership happen. Just one or two people willing to put in the effort.
Shocking that they want to close this library,which already has very limited opening times.I went to Westdene primary in the 60’s.I loved the library and went there very regularly with my mum and later on my own.I borrowed hundreds of books . I know times have changed,but reading and other cultural activities should be encouraged.