Sir, – Moves to automate Dún Laoghaire public library and to close up to three libraries in Co Sligo are the culmination of a sustained attack on public services, education and culture in recent years.
For almost 200 years, public libraries and reading rooms have provided a means of education, access to information, and personal fulfilment. The public library still performs those essential functions.
To treat libraries as mere storage facilities, as buildings to be policed, is to ignore their role at the heart of social progress in our communities.
Ireland ranks 15th out of 24 states in the OECD Adult Skills Survey, with one in six adults demonstrating difficulty with basic written information.
Our public libraries, buttressed with additional staff and funding from central government, are needed now as much as ever. – Yours, etc,
Dr ANGELA BYRNE,
Culdaff,
Co Donegal.