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12
Nov
What North Yorkshire libraries plan to do with their David Walliams books
North Yorkshire’s libraries are continuing to stock hundreds of books by children’s author David Walliams despite allegations of sexual misconduct and inappropriate behaviour against him.
Mr Walliams has been accused by several women of sexual misconduct and inappropriate behaviour in a joint investigation by the Guardian and ITV News. He denies any wrongdoing.
The author has sold more than 60 million books worldwide. However, retailers TGJones and The Works have stopped selling his titles, while publisher HarperCollins withdrew his back catalogue in September.
The Stray Ferret asked North Yorkshire Council how many of Mr Walliams’ books were held across its library network and whether it planned to remove them from its catalogue.
Knaresborough Library
A council spokesperson confirmed that 567 David Walliams books are currently held across its 42 libraries.
The council did not indicate any plans to withdraw the books but said demand for the author's work had “fallen significantly”.
The spokesperson said:
Libraries follow established professional and ethical principles around stock availability – the starting point is that all books should be made available to readers unless the content of those books is illegal.
But libraries continually refresh their collections in response to what their users want to read. In this case, North Yorkshire Council understands that demand for the author’s books has fallen significantly in recent years.
We would therefore expect the number of copies in circulation to decline naturally as they are replaced by newer and more popular titles, particularly as he is now without a publisher.
The spokesperson added that any books withdrawn from stock “may be recycled”.
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