THE councillor responsible for York’s libraries ran up a £22.80 fine – only for it to be waived by the city’s library chief, The Press can reveal.

Coun Nigel Ayre, executive member for leisure, was excused paying the fine after experiencing “extremely poor customer service”, said Fiona Williams, City of York Council’s head of libraries and heritage.

Coun Ayre said he did not know the fine was being waived and never spoke to staff about it, and Ms Williams insisted he had not been given special treatment.

But an opponent of the Liberal Democrat councillor said he had shown a “remarkable lack of judgement” and the matter now looks set to be investigated by the council’s standards committee.

Coun Ayre, Liberal Democrat councillor for Heworth Without, said he had cause to report several library issues to officials in the space of three days, about availability of stock, online facilities, library search facilities and staff communication.

He said: “Unknown to me the library manager chose to waive a fine, as would have been the case for any member of the public.

“Without wishing to discuss intimate personal information, fines were incurred by another family member during a divorce process. I did not therefore feel it was appropriate to reinstate the fine.”

In a separate email to Conservative councillor Paul Healey, who found out about the incident, Coun Ayre said: “I would take very seriously any allegations that individuals has received preferential treatment because of their status and would raise this with senior officers. I am reassured this has never happened.”

Coun Healey said a library worker had raised concerns that there had been preferential treatment and he intended to refer the matter to the council’s standards committee to “ascertain the full facts.”

He claimed: “At the very least, this shows a remarkable lack of judgement by Coun Ayre.” Coun Ayre said he too would ask the standards committee to investigate, “so that it can be made clear that there was no preferential treatment”.

Ms Williams, in an email to Coun Healey, said library fines were waived for various reasons, with each case judged separately.

She said: “We base our decisions on situations such as illness, poor customer experience, misunderstandings etc.”

She said last year, when the Central Library closed for refurbishment, people were given a long loan period which had to be extended several times due to the project running late because of snow. She said new items borrowed on reopening were subject to the normal loan period though, which caused “some confusion”.

She said more fines than normal were waived as a result, and said: “Nigel’s fine was caught up in this, with his books being taken out as we reopened.”

When a user owes more than £10, they cannot be issued books until the charge is resolved and Ms Williams said: “Nigel experienced extremely poor customer service when attempting to discover the reason for this and so I decided to waive the fine.”

She said she treated Coun Ayre “as I would any member of the public”.

Customers ran up about £47,000 in fines at York’s libraries last year. Of those about 85 per cent were paid, and 15 per cent waived.


‘Confidentiality breached’ – councillor

NIGEL AYRE accused Conservative Paul Healey of electioneering, and said confidentiality had been breached.

He said nobody’s library records should be disclosed and said Coun Healey had “highlighted a significant breach of the council’s duty on data protection”, which the council would take very seriously.