DEVOLUTION AND REGIONALISM IN THE UK
REPORT OF THE LA POLICY ADVISORY GROUP

4 Issues raised by Devolution and Regionalism

This section of the report look more closely at some of the issues raised by devolution and regionalism. It makes recommendations as to how The Library Association can maximise the benefits that librarians and library services can gain from the new national and regional topography.

The PAG wishes to draw three main areas to the attention of the LA:

• issues relating to the Library and Information Services sector as a whole
• those specifically for The Library Association
• issues relating to the three themes identified in section 3

Our recommendations follow this structure and are shown in broad context in this section. The recommendations are also listed in the concluding section of the report.

4.1 The Library and Information Sector in the Nations and Regions

Fragmentation – Regionalism and Devolution are at the root of some fragmentation of LIS specific expertise both at a government level and within local authorities and other institutions. Library issues are no longer handled by a specific person or unit within a single UK or national Government department.  Perhaps this was never fully the case but, as especially noted in Wales and Northern Ireland, they are now spread across a number of people and departments. Similarly local government reorganisation has often resulted in smaller authorities with diluted expertise, unable to continue a championing and advocacy role for their service.

Fragmentation of expertise and resourcing is a manifestation of the emerging diversity of approach and provision as new partnerships and alliances are formed to tackle many deep-rooted and cross-cutting concerns such as poverty, educational attainment or health. This diversity needs to be celebrated and embraced rather than feared. As the new political and societal processes mature, the LIS sector needs to identify gaps and channel the tide rather than fight against new structures.

This landscape sets fresh challenges and offers new opportunities for the sector. A LIS focus is needed at each administrative and Government level to identify and exploit opportunities and make the case for the sector, its services and practitioners.  The LA should facilitate effective networking within the sector at all levels.

We recommend that:

Integration  - As Government and others focus increasingly on the cross-cutting agenda, so the LIS sector, as a whole or in parts, is encouraged into partnership, and in some cases integration, with other sectors. It is therefore important that all regional LIS bodies in England should continue the move from an inward and operational focus (such as administering inter-library loans) to an outward, cross-cutting and strategic focus (such as that provided by a number of the regional Library Development Agencies).  This will create the capacity to build the necessary new alliances for libraries to prosper in the future. It is worth noting that in England the sub-regional agenda – notably in regard to the Learning and Skills Councils and Small Business Services - will be a critical dimension of regional agendas.  The LIS sector in each region will need to determine how best to address more local dimensions. The PAG recognised that, given different historical starting points and the wide complexities of organisational infrastructure in the English regions, there is no single model for a regional library development agency.

Re:source – the Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries, is the most clear example of the new integrationist trend and it is important for the LA, and the sector as a whole, to build a constructive and forward-looking relationship with the Council. However the PAG wishes to emphasize that the “re:source agenda” reflects only one set of dimensions where the LIS sector will naturally build or reinforce alliances.  It should not be allowed to crowd out other important cross-sectoral opportunities. The Home Nations have an advantage over the English regions with the strong LIS focus provided by Library and Information Services Councils.  The PAG notes that Wales is considering the possibility of establishing an integrated body similar to Resource.

We recommend that:

LA/BL/Resource Regional Development Officer initiative - the PAG has been interested to hear of the discussions between the LA, BL and Resource about possible joint action in the Regions and note that this development is applicable only to England. We welcome the leadership that the three organisations are prepared to exercise and their concern to support the necessary changes to build a robust LIS presence within the English regions.  We understand that a further report on this will be presented at the same Policy & Resources Committee as this report. Our comments are based on information we have been provided about initial discussions between the three Chief Executives in April and Bob McKee’s report to the last LA P&RC meeting, relating to the intention to create a Library Development Officer for the Regions and pilot initiatives in three of the English regions. Our comments on fragmentation and integration will be of relevance to this project. In addition we offer the following more detailed comments and recommendations:

4.2 The LA in the Nations and the Regions

The structure of the LA itself is a key factor in the ability of the LIS sector to meet the challenges of devolution and regionalism. The LA is one of the largest LIS bodies, continues to have a specific LIS focus and operates at UK, national, regional and local levels as well as having an international dimension and membership. Therefore it can help facilitate many of the processes we have recommended and act as part of the glue during the current reconfiguration period as the LIS infrastructure adjusts to devolution and regionalism. In so doing it will also, we believe, offer more opportunities and benefits to its members.

We have discussed some of the more important powers that have been devolved to the Home Nations or the English Regions in previous sections and looked at some of the consequences for the LIS sector. We are also aware of the key results of the Scottish Library Association’s review of its own structure and its relations with the UK Library Association as reported to its Council in February.  The report of the review recommends that the present structure between the SLA and the LA should be retained. Welcome as this conclusion will be to LA members in other parts of the UK, we recognise that Branches in all the Home Nations will have to deal with a much wider range of issues and interact with an increasing number of organisations and agencies. Although the position in the English regions may be less advanced than elsewhere in the UK, recent signs from the present Government suggest that elected regional chambers may well be on the agenda for their next term if re-elected. It is clear that this devolution of power to the nations and regions needs to be matched by a similar devolution (with resources) within the LA structure.  To do otherwise would be to risk the resentment of some members that their autonomy as a nation or region was not being acknowledged, and to make it more difficult, if not impossible, to deal with the new political agendas at that level effectively.

We are aware that the LA itself is in the process of major change as it approaches unification with the Institute of Information Scientists and that it has already looked at some areas of its structure with relevance to the regions. At the time of writing the Branches Working Party still has to report, although we have seen some of the documentation considered by the Working Party. Inevitably our report and recommendations covers some of the ground being looked at by the Working Party.  We hope that our recommendations will provide a perspective and framework within which to view the future of the branch structure and the recommendations of the Working Party.

We welcome the commitment of the new unified professional body to organise its branches along the new Government Regions (or RDA areas). However we believe that in many regions – especially those covering large geographic areas or with high populations - it will be necessary to form sub-branches to enable networking amongst members and facilitate local meetings across the sectors to look at the more practical implications of implementing regional/sub-regional or national policy. We believe that each Branch in England should form a close alliance with the new regional LIS development agencies. This approach should facilitate the articulation of the “one LIS voice” to those the LIS sector wishes and needs to influence.

Given our expectation that a single model for the regional library development agencies is unlikely, this will necessitate identifying – and supporting with the necessary resources – the key roles that the Branch should be expected to play in such alliances and what they have to offer the agencies. Some may well play a much wider role depending on their circumstances and the individuals serving them, but there must be a “guaranteed” core remit undertaken by all English Branches. We believe this will strengthen the capacity of Branches as, for the first time, they will be genuine players in policy development at a regional level and still have opportunities to influence national policy through the channels of the new professional body.

The new professional body needs to identify the resources necessary to support the Branches in these roles. The Associations in the Home Nations are already experiencing the wider remit and heavier workload and expectations – they will always need greater autonomy as the focus of a national identity. The Branches in the English regions will come to face similar pressures in the not too distant future. One last aspect should be mentioned and that is the role of the centre – Ridgmount Street – in the regions. The new agendas associated with regionalism and devolution make equity of services to all members no matter where they live or work a matter of greater urgency and priority than ever before. The new professional body needs to innovate in delivering its services to members. Naturally it will look to ICT and networking as a way of modernising its services and offering a more distributed approach to accessing LIS resources. Opportunities should be sought to partner Branches and/or other organisations in the regions to provide, for instance, similar high quality training opportunities as are currently available at Ridgmount Street.

We recommend that:

4.3 Cross-cutting Themes

The PAG considered three cross-cutting themes, Lifelong Learning, Generating/regenerating the Economy, and Citizenship and Culture, and how they might inform its recommendations on regionalism and devolution.

Lifelong Learning - Considering this theme in terms of the professional body’s CPD responsibilities to its members, much of the agenda is not influenced by regionalism and devolution. It is a key policy area for the European Community, including mobility of labour and mutual recognition of qualifications. The multi-domain world in which professionals now operate is global in its impact and an increasing feature of working life across the UK. The library and information “profession” itself now encompasses a much wider set of skills and perspectives that need to be understood and incorporated into the picture of a knowledge driven economy, in which librarians and information specialists are themselves lifelong learners.

However each of the Home Nations is developing its own distinctive learning infrastructure with which the LIS community within those Nations needs to engage. There is also a developing sub-national and sub-regional learning infrastructure of increasing importance.  This includes the Learning and Skills Councils in England, the Local Committees for Education and Training in Wales and the Education and Library Boards in Northern Ireland.

The PAG welcomes the recent decisions of the Policy and Resources Committee regarding engagement with the Learning and Skills Councils.  We note the importance Resource attaches to this agenda and its intention to establish Learning Support Units in the English Regions and its work on a Learning and Access Framework.  Other relevant issues for the professional body are the cross-sectoral and cross-domain focus of future work to implement “Empowering the Learning Community”, increasing collaboration between FE and HE to widen participation, the role of regional HE consortia in relation to local Learning & Skills Councils, the emergence of e-university projects and the impact of LearnDirect on the role of public libraries

We recommend that:

Generating/regenerating the economy - This agenda has been the key driver of regionalism within England and an important new centre of government activity in the Home Nations. Certainly in England, despite some examples of imaginative work by library and information professionals, it would be difficult to argue that the LIS sector or profession is recognised as a key player or component in this area. The sector has been strangely silent in looking at the information needs of the new Regional Development Agencies.  Where is the profession in the Knowledge Observatories being set up by some of the RDAs or the intelligence units preferred by others and how effective have it been in arguing the need for an information dimension in regional economic plans?  We can point, however, to examples of information professionals supporting businesses.  Recognition and influence will perhaps be best achieved through the development of networks and networking at national and regional levels – Robert Craig’s work with Digital Scotland is a good case in point – or the social inclusion agenda of neighbourhood renewal or rural sustainability.

While recognising difficulties to be addressed in breaking into this agenda we recommend that:

Citizenship and Culture - In the citizenship, and the “Modernising Government” agenda generally, there are library successes. Public libraries have established roles as public access points for Europe through the European Public Information Centre networks run in partnership between the Commission and the Society of Chief Librarians.  These now cover some 98% of public library authorities in the UK.  Public libraries act as link libraries for the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly.  The Robert Gordon Institute has done a great deal of work on the role public libraries can develop to support citizens and citizenship.  The Civic Forum in London is looking to work with libraries in the future to extend democracy and important components of democracy such as transparency and accountability of Government.  The Scottish Civic Forum has a similar role in Scotland. Public libraries have been specifically singled out by Ministers in each of the Home Nations as having an important role in helping to modernise public services in the UK, especially through the roll-out of the People’s Network. The citizenship and the modernising government agenda brings us back again to the themes of partnership, customer focus, and multi-skilled teams – to fragmentation and integration as the kaleidoscope of shapes and colours re-arranges itself once more to a pattern that suits the times.

In England all library and information services have the opportunity to be included in local and regional cultural strategies and to participate in the work of Regional Cultural Consortiums. The other nations are developing cultural plans and Scotland has already published its cultural strategy that includes libraries – “Creating our Future: Minding our Past”.   Funding streams for digitisation from the New Opportunities Fund, collaborative projects supported under the Research Support Libraries Programme and the BL, European cultural funding programmes have all contributed to enable libraries to play a pivotal role in bringing cultural heritage to wider audiences.

We recommend that:

5. Summary of Recommendations