I think we have to find a middle ground between speaking plainly and speaking in political language.

While the vision in the document is validly about libraries, I think that the only bit that is specific to public libraries is “free access to knowledge, information and ideas”. If you look at the rest of the vision and substitute in “Australia’s churches” or “Community Football” or “St John’s Ambulance Volunteers”, then all the points would be just as applicable.

I’m concerned that without specifically talking about what we do that is different from other community facilities, the vision just says “we can play nicely together and you should value us”… which is not terribly concrete. I think the focus should be on *what exactly* is in it for the people making the decisions. Every institution that wants funding will promise best practice and say that it should be valued.

If we (the profession), want to be taken seriously by politicans we need, and must speak the language to demonstrate how we are achieving their priorities for the nation. Free access to knowledge, information and ideas – while worthy and is what we do, it doesn’t explain the significance of the role public libraries have within a community and peoples lives.