London Library Campaign Group

Your Library is Threatened!

The Library management’s Capital Connections plan threatens the character of our Library, based on a limited, opaque member consultation.

The main features of (Part 2 of) the plan are:

• To make a new quasi-commercial café on the 6th floor, replacing the current members’ area.
• To create a Garden Terrace for the use of members and members’ guests on the 5th floor.
• A large new lift is to be installed, running from the Lightwell reading room in the basement to the 6th floor.
• The storage areas currently on the top floor will be moved to the basement, where, in addition to a kitchen, dedicated new areas will be set aside to store the Library’s extensive rare books and archive.

Management tell us that, based on their surveys, a majority of the Library’s members approve its plans.

We have a number of objections to and questions about these plans, namely:

1. How many members are actually in favour of these plans? The survey carried out after the publication of the Capital Campaign brochure was responded to by a tiny proportion of the membership, yet is being used to claim support for the plans.
2. How reliable is the projection of 800 new members over three years? What is it based on? If the 800 new members don’t materialise, how will the Library’s financial future be secured? If this projection is doubtful, what case is there for the café?
3. We have concerns about the likely day-to-day financial viability of the café.
4. We have concerns about the likelihood of construction cost overruns, in the current inflationary environment, which may destabilise the Library’s financial position.
5. The new lift has to be sited in a recently completed (and award-winning) reading space. It will be visible, and no doubt audible, from the main reading-room. Why risk ruining the Library’s principal and best-loved study area? 
6. Management maintains that there will be an increase in the number of readers’ desks, but this is only the case if you count small coffee tables in the café as readers’ desks. Otherwise there will be less seating with which to accommodate the projected 800 new members.
7. Last, but not least, the building work involved in the Capital Plan will cause great disruption to users of the Library for many months.

For all these reasons, we – a group of members critical of the plans – are requesting an Extraordinary General Meeting, as allowed for in the Library’s articles of association, so that the merits of the Capital Plan being promoted by the Management can be fully and openly debated with Members, the Trustees and the Director. 

If you share our concerns about the impact of these plans on the Library’s character and finances, please join the Campaign Group.

This is our Library.

The Library is owned by its members and it is our membership fees which provide the bulk of the Library’s income. It is we who will (again) have to rescue the Library if the management’s projections are wrong. It is our approval that Management must seek before it embarks on the planned new café, new kitchen and other changes.

• The lack of provision for Members in the Library’s proposal.
• The change in atmosphere.
• The lack of transparency regarding costs and finances.
• Questions on how necessary this work is, and how it will affect members. Also, read press reaction to the Library’s proposals.

You can also find out more about us, and how we use the library here.