Research indicates that the benefits of the reading journey can be far reaching. Reading is a source of pleasure and entertainment, a way of relieving stress, a form of escapism, a means of finding things out, of learning and improving knowledge and of self development [Reading the Situation: Book Reading, Buying and Borrowing Habits in Britain, BML and The Reading Partnership, 2000]. In building the individual it can also contribute to the building of better communities, offer common ground on which to create new reading focused partnerships and deliver on national and local policy priorities such as social inclusion and lifelong learning.

Public libraries are leading the way in delivering reading and developing readers. The public library network provides an unrivalled national and local network of community sites and outreach facilities and is the most well-used and popular cultural institution in this country - 58 per cent of the population has a library card and there are 324 million library visits a year [See Public Libraries and Readers, the Evidence and the Arguments at www.readingagency.org.uk]. Reader support is high on the agenda. Libraries are developing innovative ways to reach new and existing readers to make their reading experience better. They are using new approaches to display and promotional work, changing the physical lay out of the library to make it more reader friendly and using experimental reader software to help readers choose books. They are also working hard to target new groups of readers including the traditionally hard to reach - children in care, teenagers, and fathers in prison - in order to open up more reading for more people.

Key policy developments reinforced by new ways of working are repositioning the reader at the heart of the twenty-first century public library vision; shaping work force development and training, changing staffing structures and generating new ways of working both within the library building and outside in the community. New partnerships are being built on the common ground offered by reading with a range of stakeholders drawn from areas as diverse as the arts funding system, education, the youth sector and business.

The impetus for this focus on creative reading activity has come from an exciting relationship between the profession and external agencies working with libraries but operating outside local authority structures. These agencies have become catalysts for change with the flexibility to seize and develop national opportunities. Examples include Bookstart, delivered by Booktrust, a national programme involving close collaboration between libraries and the health sector to encourage parents to share books with children from an early age and Branching Out, a national reading focused workforce development programme delivered by Opening the Book.

The Reading Agency, funded by an alliance of arts, libraries and government bodies coming together in support of reading, is working to inspire and support libraries in creating the best possible access to books and reading for everyone. A national library development agency represents a new way of working, a single point of entry to the public library system for potential partners and a means of raising standards through the economies of scale made possible by national working. The results have been impressive. They include a national library programme in partnership with the youth sector to bring reading to young people, with basic skills providers to provide reading for emergent readers, with the BBC to support a national broadcast reading promotion and with Orange to support the Orange Prize. There has also been the delivery of World Book Day as an on-line festival via a network of 30,000 library computer terminals and The Summer Reading Challenge, an annual children's reading programme.

Creative reading practice is beginning to shape policy both within libraries, within the arts sector and within national government. The Department of Culture Media and Sport's publication 'Framework for the Future', a library strategy for the next decade. The document places books, reading and learning at the heart of libraries modern mission and acknowledges the importance of reading in stimulating the imagination, developing creativity and supporting independence in learning. The action plan delivering the strategy focuses on reading and learning in its first year. It prioritises the development of a national readers' group strategy, a reading partnership strategy and work to embed many of the national programmes already in place including reading activities with children, young people and emergent readers. This activity sits alongside work underway to develop a shared national vision for libraries' work with readers.

Creative reading activity particularly in libraries has been able to affect major change in a short space of time. Reading is emerging with the status of a powerful creative activity that is both private and shared; public libraries as key delivery agents for the reading experience. Interestingly, the value of both is also rising in relation to what they can offer a range of partners both inside and outside the cultural sector. The creative reading movement is, however, at a critical stage in its development. A huge amount of ground has been covered but this work now needs to be embedded and sustained. We need to develop new qualitative ways to evidence the value of reading that go beyond quantitative measures such as book issues currently used in libraries. We need to move from localised provision to national reading offers that mean that all readers wherever they live have access to the same reading opportunities and we also need to build existing reading partners such as the BBC and Orange into permanent structures.

The signs are that this is happening. Creative reading is moving centre stage as librarians, development agencies and the arts sector work to build a reading nation.

Debbie Hicks
The Reading Agency