Attorney General Freundel Stuart (left) listens as Chief Justice Sir David Simmons makes a point during the official opening of the Caribbean Association of Law Libraries 24th Annual General Meeting and seminar yesterday at the Law Faculty of the University of the West Indies Cave Hill Campus.
Court library compromised
6/23/2009
By Shawn Cumberbatch
ENVIRONMENTAL problems, including mould and fungus, have cost Barbados’ highest domestic court a “substantial” amount of its library material.
Chief Justice (CJ) Sir David Simmons disclosed yesterday that authorities were now looking to secure funding from the Inter-American Development Bank, as part of its Justice Improvement Programme with the island, to significantly restore the large volume of legal books and other important reading material housed in the 278-year-old Supreme Court library.
Both Sir David and Attorney-General Freundel Stuart voiced concern about the impact these environment-related issues could have, with Stuart saying most Caribbean governments had devoted larger budgets to libraries, but had not paid enough attention to training law librarians in book preservation.
The officials were speaking yesterday at the Faculty of Law, University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, during the official opening of the Caribbean Association of Law Libraries 24th Annual General Meeting and seminar.
The CJ noted that over the last few years Barbados had suffered the fate of most libraries, which “face the problem of contamination of the environment by mould, fungus and other deleterious substances”.
“We in Barbados have suffered particularly harshly in the last three or four years to the point where the library stock in the law library is in need of substantial replenishment. Fortunately, we have been able to put a project to the Justice Improvement Programme and with the blessing of the Inter-American Development Bank I trust that we shall secure the requisite funding to replenish quite a large part of the book stock in the library,” he said.
With this concern in mind, Sir David said judicial officials did not want to acquire the material they lost and “remain in the building where we have been ever since 1731”.
He therefore hoped that by the end of this year they would move into the new Halls of Justice facility “and the law library should be operational”.
The official also saw the need “for proper qualified staff in the law library to manage the book stock and to ensure that the environment in which we house books is also conducive to the longevity of the books”.
Collaboration
Additionally, he called for greater collaboration between the Office of the AG and the Supreme Court’s library.
“I hope...that in the near future some mechanism can be found where the library of the Office of the Attorney-General and the library of the Supreme Court and the users of those two libraries can have access, on an organised basis, to the various Websites that are there purveying legal materials. I think it’s absolutely crucial that especially the Bar has the ability to access these materials at reasonable rates,” he noted.
“In my opinion the development of a project that will achieve those objectives is not beyond us to develop in a consultative way among all of the relevant players and I hope that within the next year, before the next meeting of this association, we in Barbados are able to hammer out the present difficulties that do not promote the kind of coordinated approach that I feel is necessary.”
Stuart was concerned that lack of training in book preservation “means that sometimes we have difficulties not only in expanding and keeping our collections current, but in knowing how to preserve them from mould, dust and other environmental problems”.
“This is a deficiency in the training of our librarians, which must be made good. It is not all of them who must be trained in book preservation – one or two from within the Civil Service should suffice. These, along with archivists who have received specialised training should be available for consultation in the event that some libraries experience,” the AG added.
