Villagers wait to find out if they have a case

Cash raised from the Save Our Stories fun day held at Newarthill Bowling Club in August as part of the campaign to save the library could be used to kickstart a legal challenge.

Newarthill Community Council hosted a “passionate” meeting in Brannock High last week as the future of the facility was discussed.

The community council is investigating plans to create a management committee to run a community hub, which would contain a library, run independently of North Lanarkshire Council and Culture NL.

However, a group of residents feel there may be a legal route to force the local authority to keep the library open and have wrtten to the Faculty of Advocates to see if they have a case.

Angie Walker, who is spearheading the legal move, said: “Our position is quite clearly that Culture NL should not be closing the library and we are hoping to get a judicial review on the matter.

“The Faculty of Advocates takes on a certain number of cases and we are hoping to hear back from them soon about whether ours is one they feel they can move forward with.

“A fun day over the summer the year raised £1,000 for the campign to save the library and the community council have said we can use it, and if we need more money then we’ll fundraise for it.

“We are not trying to split the village, we just feel there may be another option to save the library that is worth investigating while the community council looks into the hub proposal.

“Last week’s meeting once again proved villagers are very passionate about saving the library and we will exhaust every avenue to do so.”

Meanwhile, Craigneuk Library will close on Friday, October 28, items borrowed can be returned to any North Lanarkshire library.