§ Lord Jenkins of Putneyasked Her Majesty's Government:
In view of the recent statement by the National Book Committee that one in 12 of the new books that were to be bought by British public libraries cannot now be purchased because of cuts in expenditure, whether the Secretary of State will use his statutory powers to investigate and improve the situation.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Department of National Heritage (Viscount Astor)The Government's standard spending assessments should allow local authorities to maintain their range of statutory and non-statutory services at reasonable levels. The allocation of resources is a matter for individual local authorities, and this includes decisions about spending priorities, including the level of spending on the book fund.
The Secretary of State for National Heritage continues to monitor the provision of public library services in England, including book expenditure, by analysing statistics and by investigating complaints; and the department is prepared to intervene directly where there is doubt about an authority's ability or willingness to fulfil its statutory obligations under the Public Libraries and Museums Act 1964.