Liberal Democrats proposed a £500,000 boost for Hampshire's Book Fund.

Written by Cllr Robin Hughes and published in Andover Advertiser on Sun 16th Mar 2008

I am surprised that Hampshire County Council's Executive Member for Recreation & Heritage, Councillor Margaret Snaith, should deliberately misrepresent how I and my fellow Liberal Democrat councillors voted at Hampshire's recent budget meeting.

I hope you will allow me to set the record straight.

While I voted AGAINST the overall Conservative budget (which included a Labour Party amendment adding £350,000 to the Book Fund), I voted FOR a Liberal Democrat amendment adding £500,000 to the Book Fund, an amendment which Councillor Mrs Snaith and the Conservatives voted against.

There was no opportunity for a separate vote on the Book Fund alone.

The facts are these:

i) Liberal Democrats proposed a £500,000 boost for Hampshire's Book Fund.

ii) Labour proposed a more modest (but still welcome) £350,000 boost for the Book Fund.

iii) The Conservatives proposed no increase at all but didn't oppose the Labour amendment, accepting it without a vote. They have since tried to claim as their own.

Given that over the past five years Councillor Mrs. Snaith and her Conservative colleagues have cut over £2 million from Hampshire's Library Book Fund. As well as making two-thirds of Hampshire's professional librarians redundant and cutting the overall libraries budget by £1 million in the past year alone. I'll leave readers to judge the Conservatives' real motives in accepting a Labour Party proposal to put a little of that money back into the Book Fund during the coming year.