VOLUNTEERS will make history at Puddletown Library next month when they take over two shifts a week to run the branch themselves.

Mike Chaney, chairman of the Friends of Puddletown Library, said the team of volunteers was in the middle of a crash course in how to run a library – ready for the off on November 3.

He said: “We’ve been told that when we start work on our own for the first time we will be making history. We believe we are the first volunteer librarians to be incorporated into a county library service anywhere in the country.

“The training we are being given is reassuring and comprehensive but we know that we cannot be fully fledged librarians after just a few days of instruction. We are obviously going to have to learn the job as we do it – and hope that not only the users of our library but also our professional colleagues will be patient with us.”

The friends group was formed in response to cuts imposed by Dorset County Council to meet a squeeze on its libraries budget.

The economies meant reductions in hours across the county’s 34 libraries with effect from next month. The hours provided by the council’s librarian at Puddletown will be cut from 10-and-a-half to six a week.

Mr Chaney said the first volunteers will take over when the professional librarian goes home at the end of her shift at 5.30pm – and they will run the library until 7pm – the usual closing time for the past few years.

The team will man the library on Monday evenings and Friday afternoons to maintain the service.

The volunteers’ training includes instruction on how to work the new self-service system which was installed in Puddletown last week. It was also installed in Dorchester, Weymouth, Burton Bradstock and Colehill libraries. Over the next two years the system, costing £1.3million, will be introduced into all Dorset libraries.

The changes came after protests by communities following the council’s original decision to close 13 small libraries. The council opted instead to retain the libraries but cut opening hours and allow volunteers to run community libraries to keep them open outside core hours.

So far, volunteers from only Puddletown and Burton Bradstock have started training.

Mr Chaney said volunteers had been used at libraries in Cambridgeshire but not as part of the county’s library service.