NEWS FEATURE
Future library explored
When a panel of experts gathered by the Libraries All Party Parliamentary Group debated the future of public libraries, the consensus was a vision of libraries as multi-use platforms where almost anything can happen, reports Rob Mackinlay.
FEAR of the future increases our desire to predict it. If that’s true, it may be telling that a number of reports have been published recently, examining the future of public libraries. The authors of a selection of these were gathered by the Libraries All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for a round- table discussion to address the many uncertainties and opportunities that public libraries now face. The panel of the Creating the Library of the Future roundtable covered interna- tional, national, regional and professional perspectives.
Julian Diamond, Head of IM at Arup, talked about their Future Libraries report which looks at worldwide demographic trends such as urbanisation, ageing pop- ulations and the nature of work, and the potential for libraries to respond. Douglas White, representing Carnegie UK, outlined fi ndings of its report Shining a Light – an examination of library use and user attitudes in the UK – explaining the signifi cance of its fi ndings to the future of public libraries in the UK.
Richard Heseltine, Chair of the James Reckitt Library Trust, outlined the Trust’s work on imagining the future of public library services: Rethinking Public Library Services in Hull: a framework for transfor- mation and growth, which is being used to develop a fi ve to 10 year strategic plan for Hull libraries.
Caroline Brazier, Chief Librarian at the British Library, provided the perspective of a national institution and described
14 INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL
Rob Mackinlay (@cilip_reporter2,
rob.mackinlay@
cilip.org.uk) is Senior Reporter, Information Professional.
pioneering work the BL is doing with the public library network across the UK. And Nick Poole, Chief Executive of CILIP discussed the library workforce of the future and how to build it.
Debate
Despite covering diff erent geographies, timescales and perspectives, there was plenty of common ground. The fi ndings of the reports were explored during the discussion which involved other guests from relevant organisations. Gill Furniss, Labour MP and Shadow Min- ister for Steel, Postal Services and Consumer Protection, is Chair of the APPG. In her introduction she listed Artifi cial Intelligence, lifelong learning, health information and a number of other “big issues that we must explore and understand so we can plan and develop public libraries and library services of the future.”
December-January 2017/18
NEWS Gill Furniss
pp14-16.indd 4
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