WITH regards to the Library consultation and councillor Keith Mitchell.

In his summing up at the cabinet meeting, he could not refrain from insulting the library campaigners by telling us to get off our backsides and volunteer.

It is sad that he cannot learn from his mistakes.

Earlier this year, he personally criticised, Dr Diana Saunders by saying she didn’t care about people, only about books.

After it was pointed out that she counsels terminally-ill patients, he still went on to call library campaigners lefties who don’t care about social care.

One of our friends’ group responded in a letter to this paper. What Gillian Cox did not describe, because she is a modest person, was the role she played in the founding of the Alzheimer’s Disease Society and her continuing involvement in the Oxfordshire branch.

Another is Barbara Boyne, the Chair of Kennington Good Neighbours, who has given more lifts and help to housebound people than Keith has conducted meetings.

On Monday, December 12, faced with a room full of volunteers, whom his consultation has diverted into months of unnecessary work he heaped insult upon injury.

Volunteers have a superb contribution to make in the community but, as a baby boomer, the very idea of making poorly-paid young librarians redundant and using taxpayers’ money to train older people to do their work for free is not a worthy aim.

SYLVIA VETTA, Chair, Friends of Kennington Library, Upper Road, Kennington