Tool Libraries Are Overdue

Craig DalzellIn December 2021, the Scottish Government made a promise to the Scottish Climate Assembly. In December 2024, their deadline passed with the promise now overdue.I remain extremely proud of my role as an expert witness to the Climate Assembly. The process and results of it were a lesson I’ll carry for a lifetime. Around 100 ordinary people in Scotland came together, discussed extremely complex and nuanced topics and laid down recommendations not only far ahead of anything that anyone in elected politics could come up with but also achieved near-consensus on extremely radical policies that could never be reached by pandering to a mythical “political centre”. I must emphasise that last point. Seeking a “political centre” that doesn’t exist has resulted in the political failure we see around us today. Properly informing the public and then asking them what they want those with power to do about it leads to calls for far more radical action.However, the Climate Assembly suffered from the same problem that almost all Citizens’ Assemblies have suffered. The politicians liked to get the kudos for setting them up, but fundamentally didn’t trust the people taking part in them and therefore did not make a firm commitment to follow their recommendations wherever they might have led. Instead, we got a response from the Scottish Government that almost entirely consisted of replying to each recommendation with “we’re not going to do that, we’re already doing this far smaller thing instead”.With one major exception. Tool Libraries.The Assembly called for the Scottish Government to set up a network of tool libraries – ideally one in every 15 minute neighbourhood. The Government response was to say that by the end of 2024, there would be at least one hundred tool libraries in Scotland. At the time of publication of that pledge, there were 24 libraries in Scotland. By the end of the deadline last month, that number had increased to just 31. The reason for this is that the Government simply didn’t bother to put money where their mouth was. They gave £300,000 to Circular Economies Scotland to promote the idea of tool libraries and other Circular Economy resources but this wasn’t anywhere near enough to effectively do that and, crucially, none of that money was allowed to be spent on setting up or running the libraries themselves (this isn’t an attack against CES who knew full well the limitations placed on them and worked as hard as they could regardless). Even if we massage the numbers by including repair cafes (something that wasn’t in the Government’s initial pledge but got added during the funding announcement) we still end up more than a dozen short.During the initial discussions about the promise, I attended a stakeholder meeting with the Circular Economy Minister at the time, Lorna Slater (The title of Minister for the Circular Economy was dropped by Humza Yousaf when he ended the SNP/Green Cooperation Agreement and John Swinney folded the role into the remit of Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero and Energy so the Minister responsible at the time of writing is Gillian Martin, filling in for Màiri McAllan). I asked Slater at the time if the Government thought that 100 Tool Libraries would be enough to meet the objective they are supposed to achieve and she admitted that they knew it wouldn’t be, but that “we hope that the private sector will fill the gap”. Well, guess what. Apart from a little tinkering around the edges, the private sector hasn’t filled that gap because why would they? Their business model is based on you buying things, not borrowing them. They don’t make their annual sales figures go up by selling one really good thing borrowed by ten people instead of selling those ten people as many cheap, throwaway things as they can successfully advertise to them.I can’t say I wasn’t disappointed when I read the Government’s response to the Climate Assembly but if I had been asked if I could only have one policy out of the whole book...well, I would have asked for a PassiveHaus Bill (which we’re kind of, sort of, getting despite the Government knocking the Assembly back on that demand). But if you had said that I could have had TWO policies out of the list, the second would have been ubiquitous tool libraries.The reason for this isn’t so much because of their direct impact. That impact would be substantial. A lot of people aren’t able to do work around their house for lack of tools or for lack of GOOD tools and a lot of resources are consumed to create goods that aren’t used efficiently. Fixing both of those problems is objectively a good thing. But the biggest advantage of tool libraries is the mindset change they create. The first thing you borrow from a tool library will be something that you could buy but you need right now (maybe you broke the last blade on your saw), without waiting for a delivery, or that you can’t be bothered travelling into town to pick up. The next thing you borrow will be the thing you see on the wall that you always thought you could use but couldn’t justify the expense of buying (a hedgetrimmer for example). Before long, you’ll be looking at the DIY you have to do, and you’ll think “I don’t need to buy that tool, the library has it.”Now extend that concept to other items around your house. Books, of course. Clothes (both for fast growing kids and for you for that formal night out – let’s normalise hiring not just kilts). Games. Seeds for your garden. Maybe you start thinking not in terms of borrowing but of leasing instead of buying larger items like furniture. All of this forces producers to start making things both to last and to be easy to repair. The Circular Economy is less of a “chicken and egg” problem and more of an “if you build it, they will come” one.But the Scottish Government didn’t build it and nor did the private sector they hoped would come in their stead. They lowballed a promise they made to the people of Scotland and then they quietly missed their target and hoped to get away with it (They might have, had a certain policy wonk not been a bit obsessive about these things – You can help me and the rest of the team keep holding the Government to account with a donation here).The current Circular Economy Bill needs to be radically overhauled if it’s going to do more than increase recycling targets a little bit. It needs to include the rest of the Circular Economy too. I’ll know it’s working not when I’m able to recycle the packaging of the electric drill I just bought but when I have that mindset changing thought of “I’ll just nip down the road to the library and borrow one” instead.