PLANS to move council services into a town library will go ahead less than two years after they were dropped because of a public outcry.

East Lothian Council has announced it will move most of its customer services into Prestonpans Library with a one-day closure to allow "some changes " to be made to the building.

The proposal to turn the library, which as built in 1905 through funds from Scottish philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, into a shared facility and move council services from their offices in the town's Aldhammer House, were first put to the public in June 2016.

But they were criticised by Prestonpans Community Council, which said merging the services would take away people’s views of the library as a safe and neutral area.

And at a public meeting in the town Manja Porteus, then six, whose dad Tim is a professional storyteller and Courier columnist, appealed to the council to rethink its proposals and leave the library alone.

Following a public consultation the local authority announced it had scrapped the plans in March last year stating "the majority of respondents said that they wanted the two services to remain in separate buildings and did not want to see any changes to the Library building."

However the council has now said that following a service review it will move a wide range of services into the library from Monday, August 27.

Housing services will continue to be dealt with at Aldhammer House.

Councillor Jim Goodfellow, cabinet spokesperson for community wellbeing, said: "As more of our customers make use of online services and library staff are readily available to help people to go online, the council has reviewed its service provision and Aldhammer House will be developed to provide complementary services which give more support to the local community. 

"Meanwhile, Prestonpans Library will be developed as a joint Library/Area Office as has been done in Dunbar, North Berwick and Tranent."