Local library campaigners "warned off" as Suffolk County Council meet US company LSSI

Last month I joined a group of other library campaigners at The Endeavour House Meeting with Suffolk County Council. The meeting although clearly controlled by Cllr Judy Terry, Cabinet Lead for libraries was chaired by Anna McCreadie who is Suffolk's Interim Director for Adult and Community Services.

The outcome of the meeting was a number of actions on Suffolk CC which they have so far failed to deliver on. After some chasing last week we finally got a reply on progress from Anna McCreadie. The email didn't sound very friendly and seems to amount to us being "warned off":

Thank you for attending the meeting at Endeavour House on the 25 February 2011 in which we discussed your views and ideas regarding library services and the County Council’s consultation on the future of library services. I attach a note of the meeting.

Whilst I appreciate the passion with which you each hold your views about library services, any further work with us will need to be on a practical basis. I would be happy to hear from those of you who would like to work with county council library officers constructively on ideas for your local library services. I also expect that where you have fundamental objections to the consultation you will be making those clear by other means.

The irony is that everyone who attended the meeting is involved in developing constructive ideas just getting Suffolk to listen to them is becoming increasingly difficult.

Not so for the American company LSSI who having met Suffolk CC four times already are visiting libraries in Suffolk again this week...seems Suffolk would rather talk to them than local communities.