Activism - British Library

[the_lady_lily]

As you may have heard, the government is planning to cut the budget of the British Library by anything from 5% to 7%. The library's response is that the only way it can survive if this happens is to dramatically reduce its opening hours, and charge fees to use its reading rooms.

Obviously, as a PhD student and embryonic academic, I have a huge stake in whether this happens or not. The BL is chock full of obscure books, articles and research material that other libraries simply don't have. I've even used the BL to get an article during my MPhil year. But aside from that, the BL does a lot of outreach work to the community and puts on a number of interesting exhibits for the general public. So the result of the Government's cuts would be that the nation's pride and joy in terms of preserving documents and archival material would be limited to those who can afford an entrance charge. If that's not going to add to the image of knowledge as elitist, I don't know what will.

If you object to this, there are two things you can do - first, sign the petition on the No. 10 petitions website - I know you may all be awaiting the outcome of the Anti-Road Charging Petition, but it can't hurt. Second, go to Write to Them and e-mail your local MP. It'll only take a minute, and might make a difference.

Thanks to purple_pen for passing this on.

Comments

[atreic.livejournal.com]

As you may have heard, the government is planning to cut the budget of the British Library from 5% to 7%.

I wish all budget cuts were like that!

[the-lady-lily.livejournal.com]

*reads* Ah, yes, ambiguity. Edited - any better?

[atreic.livejournal.com]

Ah, now I understand.

[angelofthenorth.livejournal.com]

I keep meaning to do a "Save my local library" post with a link to the BL petition...