A library will not close without a fight, a councillor representing the residents pledged last night. 

The future of Ryhall Library became uncertain in January, when Rutland County Council papers revealed Rutland County Council was considering closure just months after repairs had been promised. 

Since then, there has been a public campaign to keep the doors of the 1970s building open with villagers of all ages signing a petition to underline the importance of the venue. 

The Liberal Democrat run authority's current position is that the repairs of the library, which it says would be more than £200,000, are too expensive, although campaigners dispute the cost. 

Renovations to the three other libraries in Rutland at Ketton, Uppingham and Oakham will go ahead and are currently out to tender.

There has been a large local campaign to protect the library's future (Photo: LDRS)

The library was being discussed last night as cabinet member for communities Christine Wise (Lib Dem) had asked the scrutiny committee to consider finding alternative options for a community-based service in a different venue, which were 'sustainable'. 

At the strategic scrutiny meeting held at Rutland's Catmose House headquarters in Oakham, Cllr Kevin Corby (independent) said the village wanted to be more involved in what was happening. 

He said: "All we ask for is complete transparency over what has happened and what is going to happen going forward and we want to work proactively with scrutiny or cabinet to find a good way forward. 

"We all know about community assets being lost and we are not going to let Ryhall Library go down without some sort of fight. I believe and the community believes there is a way forward. We just want the opportunity to be able to put the views to council." 



Large groups of protesters have attended a Rutland County Council meeting to show support for the library (Photo: LDRS)

Cllr Wise said the authority was 'desperate' to keep library services in Ryhall, but alternative places could be considered. 

She said: "We have no intention of removing the library service from Ryhall/east of Rutland. We have issues with the existing building that at the current time the library services are delivered through, and we are desperate to find alternative, suitable, sustainable premises to be able to offer those services." 

There was a public consultation held in March about library services in the village. Cllr Wise had put the library on the agenda of the strategic scrutiny committee meeting last night, but the request was met with concern by a number of committee members, who thought that was not part of the remit. 

Cllr Samantha Harvey (Ind) said she thought the request for scrutiny to look at the issue was premature. 

She said: "When Catmose [a leisure centre that was eventually closed] did come to scrutiny, the alternatives were there already. The work had been scoped out. This looks like scrutiny is being expected to do that work, which is not the role of scrutiny. It is our role to scrutinise what the executive and senior leadership team come forward with – that's where I am struggling with it." 

Cabinet member Andrew Johnson (Lib Dem) said options for the future of the library service were known and would be given to the scrutiny committee to consider but had not been included in the request form due to space. However, scrutiny chairman Ramsay Ross (Lab) proposed the committee did not add the item to scrutiny's workload, which was unanimously agreed. 

The committee did decide to look at changes to the children's services, as proposed by the Labour government's Children's Wellbeing and School's bill. A proposal by the chairman to scrutinise the same day access proposal for Rutland Memorial Hospital was withdrawn, in part due to the extra time the integrated care board is taking to analyse the results of the public consultation.