Moves to close North Yorkshire's libraries for three weeks a year as part of a cost-cutting exercise were under fire today.

County councillors have agreed that libraries will close for a fortnight in the summer and another week at Christmas.

Up to now, the 320 staff at the county's 45 libraries have been able to take leave at any time of the year.

But the county library service hopes to save £48,000 on relief staff by requiring employees to take leave at the same time. It is currently consulting trade unions, staff and other bodies about the move.

Rosie Kett, service and conditions officer with Unison, described it as a significant change in members' pay and conditions. She also said the service provided for the four million people a year who visit North Yorkshire's libraries would suffer.

Guy Daines, head of professional practice with the Library Association, said it was a very regrettable move and said councils should be seeking to extend opening hours, not restricting them.

Jill Wight, of the Library Campaign, claimed that closing the places where children and adults obtained books defeated the objective of events such as the National Year of Reading - to be launched in September.

Ray de Graff, North Yorkshire's head of libraries and arts, said: "What we have tried to do is avoid any redundancies among our staff."He said the libraries and arts unit had to save £281,000 from its 1998-99 budget.

"It's on top of very considerable savings over the last five or six years, in the region of 30 per cent. This is another 6 per cent."

Mr de Graff said they had also "wiped out" the information technology development budget and taken £53,000 from the book fund - cutting it to less than half what it was three years ago.

The proposal does not affect libraries in the City of York area.

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