In March 2023, Aberdeen City Council announced the closure of six of the city's community branches to save £280,000 in their budget for 2023/24. This is after reducing the opening hours of all the city's libraries by 28% since the pandemic, with some individual branches having their hours reduced by as much as 64%.

In the North of Aberdeen, Northfield, Cornhill, and Woodside libraries were closed, leaving a large gap in provision in neighbourhoods that have some of the highest levels of deprivation in the city. Woodside Library was the oldest library in Aberdeen, in its 140th year having been built with a gift from a former resident, Sir John Anderson with the express request that the building only be used for the purposes of a free public library for the people of Woodside. 

Ferryhill, one of the city's two Carnegie libraries with the fourth highest footfall per weekly opening hours in the city also closed.

Towards the west edge of our city boundaries in a more rural area, Cults Library was closed.

And not far from the River Dee, Kaimhill Library which was less than a decade old and shared a building with the local primary school was closed. The neighbourhood of Garthdee has high levels of deprivation as well.

The council only gave a few weeks notice of the closures, with no consultation with any of the communities who this has the greatest impact, and with no provision in place for where the services, groups, and activities hosted within these libraries and run by library staff would be accessed as an alternative. For many people, they are only now hearing about the closure of their local library because of the press and social media attention our campaign has drawn.

We believe that libraries are an essential service. A library gives you a safe warm space to visit with no expectation to spend money, to be able to browse shelves and boxes of books, to have librarians on hand to help you research, find a way to get the information you need. They give you free use  of a computer with people on hand to help if you aren't familiar with how to do that or don't have English as your first language. And local librarians do incredible work that goes behind the scenes with collection of stories from their communities, the protection and keeping of local history archives, the care of library stock and choosing the new publications to order. They also have a wealth of knowledge that enables them to help people find just the right 'next book' to put on their to-read pile.

For those without a TV license, a library is a place where you can rent out TV series and films on DVD, you can borrow music CDs and you can even access family history websites and all newspapers for free.

Lots of activities happen in libraries from lego building, coding workshops, book clubs, ESOL sessions, community learning, Bookbug, and writing groups. There has not been any alternative solutions put in place to ensure continued equal access for library users.

For many, a library is a safe space and sometimes the only place in their community where they meet other people. 

We know that this budget saving will cost our city in the long term. Taking away the service that reduces social isolation, helps people's mental health, and assists with access to all kinds of other services that are key to the very basics of survival such as housing. 

For every £1 invested in libraries, the cost-benefit gained is £6.95. They are also key to promoting digital accessibility which costs the UK economy an estimated £63 billion every year. For many people in these communities, the library is their only way of accessing information and forms online. 

People living in poverty as less likely to be culturally, politically and civically active; this can lead to a downward spiral where the voices of those in the most deprived circumstances are not heard and their needs given less priority.

Sadly, our campaigners have not been listened to, even denied opportunities to make a statement to our local councillors, who have now voted twice to close these six libraries.

We ask Aberdeen City Council to use the contingency budget to reopen these libraries, before we lose these community services that are a vital part of our communities.