Page 3474 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 14 November 2006
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and that is a very sad thing for the people of Canberra and the public library service. (Time expired.)
MS PORTER (Ginninderra) (4.38): Mr Speaker, as you would imagine, the decision to close the Griffith library has not been taken lightly, nor is it a decision that any government would make if there were other options. Governments do not choose to make decisions that they know will be unpopular amongst sections of the electorate, but being in government is about making tough decisions, as is the case with the proposed closure of the Griffith library.
Any decision to cut a vital, much-loved community service such as a library is bound to result in public reaction ranging from concern to outrage and sadness and we are certainly seeing all those at present. We all know that many of these reactions are part of the grieving process, as Minister Hargreaves has mentioned. Sometimes, however, hard decisions have to be made to support the development of sustainable services into the future. Regrettably and sadly, such is the case with the closure of the Griffith library. Like Dr Foskey, I have spent many hours in libraries, have great fondness for books and remember visits as a child to my home library in Purley in Surrey.
Dr Veronica Lunn, author of the recently completed report on her review of the ACT Library and Information Service, has advised that the library service as a whole needs to be better positioned strategically through the realignment of existing resources and have a service delivery model that is financially sustainable if it is to continue to meet the challenges of delivering services in a rapidly changing information environment.
Dr Foskey has asked for the information on which this decision is based. Obviously, we have tabled this information today and it is due to be on the web tomorrow. So I am not sure why she claims the government either has not released this information, does not want to release this information or is refusing to share it.
The review findings demonstrate that the library’s existing service model is not sustainable, given the cost of service delivery across the current nine branches of the ACT library network, as the minister has said. Additionally, the Griffith library has comparatively high unit costs for loans, largely as a consequence of its smaller catchment area. This has been outlined in that report.
Mr Smyth, as Mr Hargreaves has said, all of the recommendations of this report and this review are still being considered. Any staff redundancies will be voluntary and any job losses will be through natural attrition or by voluntary redundancies. There will be no forced redundancies.
Mr Pratt suggested in this debate, if I understood him correctly, that professional library staff at the Griffith library could be replaced by volunteers. Perhaps Mr Pratt also believes that members of the AFP could be replaced by the volunteers in policing. For Mr Pratt to suggest that proves yet again that he fails to understand the very essence of volunteering and volunteers. Mr Speaker, the role of volunteers in organisations is to add value, not to undertake core functions. There are certain roles for volunteers in the ACT library service, and I know many of them. I have attended their functions in both my current and previous roles and I can assure Mr Pratt that in no way would they seek to undertake the role of paid staff in the library service.
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