It is heartening that Councillor Kevin Allen has come to pithy and eloquent defence of Hove Library (Letters, September 28).

I hope his intervention will help save this splendid, much-loved library.

It is astonishing that, when there is continual Government talk of residents being offered "choice", the library system is being managed in such way that - as at Brighton library - the amount on display to the public is reduced.

In 1934, Brighton Council published a booklet by Beverley Nichols about the town. This contained an interesting set of statistics. The Library, as it then was, contained 139,000 books.

After all this time and expense in building a new Brighton library, there are scarcely any more books than that, and most of them are kept in the store.

Indeed, at the recent culture meeting, people gasped when told, "we keep classic novels in the store".

As for Hove, it is deft symbolism that, contrary to wishes expressed in a public survey, money is to be spent on dumbing down its library but there is no sign of much-needed repairs to the small cinema which has been broken for so many months at Hove Museum.

Although the council likes to point out that the film industry began in Hove, it rarely says "action!" but is all too willing to say "cut!"

-Christopher Hawtree, Hove