Back to index of Nerve 20 - Summer 2012

Light Night

By Catharine Percy Huskisson (Liverpool Socialist Singers)
Photo by Ruth W. Nice

Once a year Liverpool’s cultural centres open late into the evening and the public are given free access. We thought some socialist songs would liven up the proceedings and had done a leaflet with the Anti-Cuts campaign. It was a night to remember!

As always we were welcomed by News from Nowhere and FACT. We even bagged a slot at the Town Hall, where the techies gave us their best red lighting in the very council chamber where cuts are decided. We usually have to sing these songs on the pavement outside.

If that was all too easy the Walker Art Gallery was made of sterner stuff. We had our name down for the open mike session there. The moment we made our way in, we were harassed by gallery officials. We were told our campaign leaflet was ‘inaccurate’ so we couldn’t give it out. Then our banner poles had to be given up as they might smash the glass on the gallery pictures (as if). Then we couldn’t display our banners while singing. And anyway, asked one of the apparatchiks, what songs were we going to sing?

We countered that we had just done a full session at the Town Hall and so on. We had just about reached agreement when the open mike host told us that we couldn’t perform anyway as there was no time and anyway ‘we’ve had a nice night, we don’t want any trouble’.

Well we had also had quite a nice night that we weren’t going to let them ruin. So we sang outside instead and reached many more people with our Rolf Harris song:

Stop the Library cuts, sport
Stop the Library cuts
No more ifs or buts, sport
Stop the Library cuts

The following Monday it was announced that National Museums Liverpool, which includes the Walker Art Gallery, will lose 53 jobs at the end of July.

With a Little Help from Our Friends
We Can Save Our Libraries!

Words: Catharine Percy Huskisson.
Can be sung to the tune of 'With a Little Help from My Friends' by Lennon/McCartney

What would you do if the library shut?
It's there for us all and it's free
Lending out books, clicking onto the net
In the heart of our community.

Oh we've gotta try - with a little help from our friends
To keep it alive -we'll need some help from our friends
It's gotta survive - and the cutbacks must end!

People from far way, people next door,
Tots and toddlers and their grannies too
Workers and writers and teachers and more,
We'll all be poorer if the cuts go through.
CHORUS (Oh we've gotta try…)

Let's stand up for our libraries! They need a whole lotta love!
Let's say no to the closures! And give the cuts a big shove!

A place to do homework, to add and subtract,
Read the paper, dream away some time
Pick up a picture book, check out a fact
The library is yours and it's mine.
CHORUS (Oh we've gotta try…)

Let's stand up for our libraries! They need a whole lotta love!
Let's say no to the closures! And give the cuts a big shove!
CHORUS (Oh we’ve gotta try…)

Listen to the Socialist Singers singing The Library Song in the Council Chamber at Liverpool Town Hall http://tinyurl.com/7abdvpt

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