Research Councils UK: Open Access Policy (S&T Report)

Earl of Selborne Excerpts

Thursday 28th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Selborne]

The House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, for introducing what is to many a complex subject but one, as he pointed out, which has radical implications for academic publishing. He very clearly set out some of the knotty issues which must be rapidly resolved. In this inquiry conducted by the Select Committee the process has been as valuable as the product. When we invited written evidence, we rapidly received more than 60 submissions, just about all accepting the principle of moving towards open access—not an issue, as the noble Lord has explained—but with greatly differing views on the wisdom of the present preferences and timetable of the Government and the research councils to achieve this desirable aim.

Having recognised that this is a desirable aim, we should be highly supportive of the leaders in this field; the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust have led in this respect. The MRC open access mandate has been in place since 2006 and compliance with this mandate has increased from about 24% in 2006 to almost half last year, and at the end of the transitional period proposed by the research councils of five years they hope to achieve 100% compliance.

For the areas of biomedical research with which the Medical Research Council is concerned, without doubt the gold open access model has much to favour it. That certainly is why the MRC and the other research councils have preferred the gold open access model over the green. As well as dispensing with the need for embargoes, it lends itself well to some of the quite sophisticated procedures nowadays, such as text and data mining, all of which have enormous commercial importance and importance in promoting the dissemination of knowledge.

As we have just heard, the gold model requires article processing charges—APCs—and in the case of the Wellcome Trust, the cost, which it calculated at between l% and 1.5% of its total research spend, has been met by the trust. It simply says it believes that in the field of biomedical research, the benefits flowing from open access more than justify the additional cost. It strongly supports the commitment of the research councils to provide funding via institutional block grants to meet the cost of gold open access APCs.

As the Select Committee notes, there is considerable doubt as to whether everyone who wants to publish via the gold route will be funded for the APCs. It further notes that, while the principle of favouring open access was almost universally accepted, the one-size-fits-all approach certainly was not. It is evident that the research councils now accept this and are prepared to be much more pragmatic and flexible than perhaps the original proposals seemed to imply.

The concerns of a number of organisations were particularly centred on the risk of being the first mover. While in biomedical research it is certain that the gold open access route ultimately will be followed by most other countries, it is by no means evident for other disciplines, particularly but not exclusively the humanities and social sciences. The green route, once a suitable repository is in place—many obviously now are in place—is a cheaper route. It does not rely on APCs, which at least in the early stage will have to be rationed. The very real difficulty of some researchers, such as independent scholars, in finding up-front funding for their APC is met by the green route. They have no problems. It is true that embargo periods will restrict the flow of research findings for a period but in practice we have already seen that in many cases this does not present insuperable problems for many disciplines. In other words, people are finding ways around it in so far as it represents an issue.

Subscription journals will not all wither and die. Some will be here for many more years. Therefore, having identified the direction of travel, it will be as well to recognise this and other concerns, and to ensure that in our enthusiasm for being an international leader we do not do ourselves an unnecessary disservice. The noble Lord, Lord Krebs, referred to the problems for periodicals, particularly those of learned societies. These learned societies very often rely on subscription journals for promoting their charitable objectives and their discipline, including public outreach, bursaries for students and fellowships, all of which are commendable causes. However, one has to recognise that periodicals and subscription journals first and foremost are there to disseminate knowledge. Clearly, they will have to move with the times and recognise, as the noble Lord reminded us, that things have changed dramatically in academic publishing.

Nevertheless, it is important to ensure that the transition, although abrupt as it will eventually have to be in many ways, is carried out as expeditiously as possible. It is clear that for some the repository route and green open access will not be what the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills called in its written evidence to us a legitimate second-best alternative gold. However, for some it still will remain a perfectly viable option and a legitimate, long-term strategy. For that reason, I welcome the response of the research councils to our report, which recognises that this possibility should at least be tested in future months and years.