DORSET library campaigners say they are ‘enormously cheered’ after a High Court ruling preventing neighbouring county Somerset from closing 10 of its libraries.

The ruling yesterday means that two local authorities – Somerset County Council and Gloucestershire County Council – will have to go back to the drawing board regarding the cutting of library services.

A judge in London quashed closure decisions made by the councils following a successful challenge by residents.

The councils will have to reconsider their decisions after they were declared ‘unlawful’ by Judge McKenna, sitting as a deputy High Court judge, because they failed to comply with ‘public sector equality duties’.

In Dorset there is no current legal action by campaigning group AdLib but a spokesman said it was still considering it after seeking detailed legal advice.

Graham Lee, the chairman of AdLib, said the judge’s decision that Somerset County Council needed to pay more attention to the needs of dependent people meant that the decision to cease funding to nine libraries in Dorset was ‘rushed and ill-considered’.

He said: “The parts of Dorset where most of the threatened nine libraries are located is much more rural than many parts of Somerset.”