Anstey Community Library
Annual General Meeting, 16th April 2024
1 Summary
The library service continues to be well supported by the public, and from comments received over the year they appreciate the service we provide. This will largely be down to our volunteers who create such a welcoming atmosphere.
A couple of large expenditures on the Family Room earlier in the year meant that we showed a small loss over the year, largely offset by improved sales and events held in the building., and finances remain healthy.
Staff turnover remains low.
2 Library Performance
Library performance figures for the past three years are reasonably consistent :
The longer-term trend since we opened in 2015 may be summarised :
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Trends 2015-24
12000
10000
8000
6000
4000
2000
0
2015-16 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 2019-20 2019-20 2021-22 2022-23 2023-24
Issues Joiners Borrowers
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The effects of the Covid closures are clearly shown. The numbers of joiners and of active borrowers have pretty much recovered and seem quite constant. There does seem to be a
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very slight trend downwards for the number of book issues and it would be interesting to compare this with the general experience of other libraries – possibly it reflects the increasing use of electronic books.
3 Staffing
3.1 Paid staff
We have no paid staff.
3.2 Volunteers
We have 37 registered volunteers.
There were 4 new volunteers over the year, with 2 who left.
3.3 Committee
The Committee comprises 6 members. At the start of the year these were :
Alan Prior Janet Witcomb Jenny Tomlinson Lynne Childerley Mary Hill Phil Knight (Chair)
Ros Cole joined the Committee in July 2023.
It was the turn of Jenny Tomlinson and Mary Hill to stand down for the 2024 Committee Election, with Mary declining to stand for re-election for personal reasons. Invitations to stand for election to the Committee were sent out to all volunteers in March this year. No new applications were received and consequently Jenny was returned unopposed and the Committee membership at the start of 2023-2024 is now :
Alan Prior Janet Witcomb Jenny Tomlinson Lynne Childerley Ros Cole Phil Knight (Chair)
4 Community Activities
4.1 Community Groups
We have expanded the number of U3A groups who use our Family Room this year and we now have :
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Monday morning – Wriggly Rhymers
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Monday afternoon (fortnightly) – U3A Canasta, alternating with the Royal Voluntary Service’s Dementia Group
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Tuesday morning – Wellbeing Walking Group
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Wednesday afternoon – Film & Social Club
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Thursday morning – Ukulele learners’ group
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Thursday afternoon – Anstey Young Wives
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Friday morning – U3A Board Games
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Friday afternoon (fortnightly) – Mah Jong
We have also run short Story Telling courses for young children and an Easter Crafts session (Helen Graham, Leics Council)
In addition, Hive Counselling are available for consultation by appointment
4.2 Annual Events
These are
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Spring Garden Sale (May). : £1700
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Anstey Gala (September) : £600
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Christmas Santa (December) : £550
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4.3 Summer Reading Challenge (SRC)
In 2023, in association with the national children’s charity the Youth Sport Trust, the theme was Ready, Set, Read!, a sports and games-themed Challenge to keep children’s minds and bodies active over the summer break.
Nationally, a total of 685,821 children participated in the 2023 Summer Reading Challenge (635,115 at their library and 50,706 online)
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7680 children in Leicestershire participated (7,680 at their library and 759 online)
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There was a 39% increase in participation across the network of community managed libraries
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55% children in Leicestershire completed the challenge by reading 6 books
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1,797 children joined their library to take part in the challenge
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There were 252,035 children’s book issues over the summer holiday period including 2,644 e-books
5 Works
Ceiling heaters were fitted in the Family Room and the carpet was replaced.
The extractor fan in the public toilet was replaced.
Following a survey by a tree specialist, some trimming and pruning was carried out on the five trees on the library land.
The automatic front door continued to malfunction, opening and closing at random. A new set of sensors was fitted, funded by LCC, and seems to have cured that problem but is causing having some ongoing teething problems.
5.1.1 Building Inspections Schedule
| Requirement | Regulatory Frequency |
Date of Last Test |
Date of Next Test |
|---|---|---|---|
| Asbestos | Followingchange | 15 Mar 21 | |
| Boiler Service | Annually | 05 Sep23 | Jun 24 |
| Gas Soundness | 5yearly | 15 Jul 21 | Jun 26 |
| Fire Alarm Testing | 3 monthly | See log | |
| Emergency Lighting Testing | 3 monthly | See log | |
| Intruder Alarm Testing | 6 monthly | See log | |
| Fire Extinguishers | Annually | 18 Apr 23 | Apr 24 |
| Fixed Electrical Safety | 5yearly | 09 Nov 20 | Nov 25 |
| Portable Appliance Testing | Annually | 26 Apr 22 | May23 |
| Water Temperature Monitoring | Monthly | See log | |
| Powered Doors | Annually | 01 Jan 24 | Jan 25 |
| Tree survey | 3yearly | 19 Dec 23 | Dec 26 |
| Thermostatic Valves | n/a | ||
| Lightning Conductors | n/a | ||
| Passenger and Food Lifts | n/a |
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6 Finances
Total income for the year was £18.8K and expenditure £20.4K, so we had a shortfall of £1.6K.
At the year’s end or reserves stand at £109.4K, £90K of which is in an interest-bearing account in a building society.
6.1 Income Summary
Our income is now mainly through shop sales and other earnings from day-to-day activities in the library (about 43%), with weekly events we organise (Wriggly Rhymers and the Film & Social Group) bringing in a further 15%. The remainder comes from annual events, donations and room rentals.
The main contributions to the 2022-23 income were as shown below.
Income 2023-24
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Misc
Donations
Room Rentals
Library
Events Income
Fundraising
Weekly
Groups
Photocopier
Use
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Item £K
Library Income 8013.09
Photocopier Use 663.70
Weekly Groups 2777.41
Fundraising 1612.18
Events 2439.59
Room Rentals 1204.00
Misc 296.25
Donations 1819.21
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6.2 Expenditure Summary
The largest expenditure items in 2023-24 were the purchase of a new carpet for the Family room, together withs ceiling-mounted heating (shown as Contractors ). These were both oneoff items.
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Expenditure 2023-24
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Annual S/W Licences
Charges
Purchases
Annual
Maintenance
Contractors
Utilities
Misc
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| Item | £K |
|---|---|
| Purchases | 2839.34 |
| Contractors Misc Utilities Annual Maintenance Annual Charges S/W Licences |
7074.83 1072.15 4476.10 2858.34 1083.32 1018.31 |
7 2024-25 Plans
7.1 Budget
We expect to have price increases generally in line with inflation, and perhaps some increase in online sales, but no major changes. There will be an additional income of nearly £2K from interest on our savings account.
We will be purchasing new furniture to brighten up the children’s area in the library. We expect some of the cost to come from Section 106 funds and we will fund the remainder ourselves
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The footpath from the library down to the car park is uneven and we plan to level it, either by re-laying the existing slabs or by tarmac. We are currently gathering quotes for this work but are making provision of £5K for this.
In total, while we expect our income to increase, we feel this will match the planned additional expenditure, so overall our reserves should remain constant.
8 5-Year Forecasts
8.1 Section 106 Funds
Payments are made to Section 106 (S106) funds by housing developers to the local communities as contributions to the additional costs they incur from residents moving in to the area. Beneficiaries include schools, medical centres and libraries. In our case we receive funds for things such as book purchases and library infrastructure.
We currently have several S106 payments coming to us over the next few years. These are:
| Allocated Purpose | Planned Purpose | Spend By | Amount £K |
|---|---|---|---|
| Provision and enhancement of library services |
Book stock, children’s area |
5/09/24 | 3.9 |
| Provision of books, lending media and other equipment |
New publics PCs and IT |
15/09/25 | 11.5 |
| Increase lending stock | 22/06/26 | £1.4 | |
| General | No expiry date |
0.2 |
8.2 Future Income and Expenditure
2024-25 : We expect the year to end with about £110k in reserves.
2025-26 : Our public PCs run Windows 10 and this is will no longer be supported by Microsoft. To run Windows 11 requires newer PCs, and we may also need to replace the issue desk PCs (if LCC doesn’t). In total this could mean a purchase of 7 new machines at approximately £1k each. We expect to fund this from Section 106 grants.
Our gas and electricity contracts have been fixed for several years but these will expire and we will need new ones this year, and expect to pay extra for them, leading to a rise in expenditure of perhaps £2k pa. We expect a gentle increase in revenue of about £2K so reserves should be unchanged at around £110K
2026-27 : No overall changes expected
2027-28 : No overall changes expected
2028-29 : No overall changes expected
9 Conclusions
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We have very nearly full bookings of the Family Room, benefitting the local community
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The library operation is running smoothly and finances are healthy into the future.
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We have an excellent team of volunteers with very low staff turnover.
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The fabric of the building is sound and well maintained, and we have no plans for any major changes
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Phil Knight Chairman, Anstey Community Library April 2024
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Charity Name No (if any) Anstey Community Library 1162159 Receipts and payments accounts CC16a For the period Period start date Period end date To from 01/04/2023 31/03/2024
Section A Receipts and payments
| A1 Receipts | Unrestricted funds to the nearest £ 18,825 - - - - - - - 18,825 - - - 18,825 20,422 - - - - - - - - 20,422 - - - 20,422 - 1,597 - 111,020 109,423 |
Restricted funds to the nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Endowment funds to the nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Total funds to the nearest £ 18,825 - - - - - - - 18,825 - - - 18,825 20,422 - - - - - - - - 20,422 - - - 20,422 - 1,597 |
Total funds to the nearest £ 18,825 - - - - - - - 18,825 - - - 18,825 20,422 - - - - - - - - 20,422 - - - 20,422 - 1,597 |
Last year to the nearest £ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income | 18,825 | 16,796 | ||||
| - | - | |||||
| - | - | |||||
| - | - | |||||
| - | - | |||||
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| - | - | |||||
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| Sub total(Gross income for AR) |
18,825 | 16,796 | ||||
| A2 Asset and investment sales, (see table). |
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| - | ||||||
| - | - | |||||
| Sub total | - | - | ||||
| Total receipts A3 Payments |
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| 16,796 | ||||||
| Expenditure | 20,422 | 12,470 | ||||
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| - | - | |||||
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| **Sub total ** | 20,422 | 12,470 | ||||
| A4 Asset and investment purchases, (see table) |
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| - | ||||||
| - | ||||||
| **Sub total ** | - | - | ||||
| Total payments Net of receipts/(payments) A5 Transfers between funds A6 Cash funds last year end Cash funds this year end |
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| 12,470 | ||||||
| - 1,597 | - | - 1,597 | 4,326 | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| 111,020 | - | 111,020 | 106,694 | |||
| 109,423 | - | 109,423 | 111,020 |
21/08/2024
CCXX R1 accounts (SS)
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Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period
| Categories Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees B5 Liabilities B4 Assets retained for the charity’s own use B3 Investment assets B2 Other monetary assets B1 Cash funds |
Signature Details Details Details Details Current Account Savings Account Cash Balance Account Total cash funds (agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) Details |
Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ 19,332 - 90,000 - 90 - 109,423 - OK OK Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - - - - - Fund to which liability relates Amount due (optional) - - - - - Print Name P J Knight |
Endowment funds to nearest £ |
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| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| OK | |||
| Endowment funds to nearest £ |
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| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| Current value (optional) |
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| Current value (optional) |
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| When due (optional) |
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| Date of approval |
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| P J Knight | 01-Apr-24 | ||
21/08/2024
CCXX R2 accounts (SS)
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