ACCESS TO UK RESEARCH OUTPUTS

The developing RCUK position

www.rcuk.ac.uk

Consultation to date – Phase 1

• Spring 2004-Summer 2005

• 2 workshops and dissemination of draft statements to 34 key stakeholders

• Major changes in policy including removal of a predetermined time lag for deposit

Consultation to date – Phase 2

• April-May 2005

• Consultation of all UK Universities

• Received 50 responses

• Supportive of proposed policy

• Majority has institutional repositories or are in process of setting up

Consultation to date – Phase 3

• June-Sept 2005• Public consultation• Received 84 responses from individuals and

organisations, including many of the original 34 key stakeholders and some additional universities

• Meetings held with learned societies and publishers, including the Science Council and ALPSP members

Consultation to date – Phase 3 responses

• General support for the four basic principles

Responses in 3 groups:

• RCUK proposal is balanced and reasonable, but could be strengthened

• Open access publishing is a threat and implementation should be delayed

• Proposed policy should not be implemented, in particular its requirement to deposit, as there is no real problem with the current environment

Consultation to date – Phase 3 specific issues

• 'subject to copyright and licensing restrictions‘:misunderstood by some, concern about inclusion by others

• 'an appropriate e-print repository (either institutional or subject-based) …' questions about ‘appropriate’ and about funding

• Author pay feesquestions about model, but not RCUK condition

• Peer review and version controlimportant to address

Consultation to date – Phase 3 specific issues

• Role of learned societies is important, especially in terms of peer review.

• Other issues raised:– support for addressing the accessibility of

primary research data– support for the RCUK position on VAT

Wider developments - 1

• The Wellcome Trust: – from 1st October 2005, all papers from new research projects

must be deposited in PubMed Central or UK PubMed Central within 6 months of publication.

• US National Institute of Health: – starting 2 May 2 2005, NIH-funded investigators are requested

to submit to the NIH National Library of Medicine's (NLM) PubMed Central (PMC) an electronic version of the author's final manuscript upon acceptance for publication

• The Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council – adopted the principle of open access and is

undertaking a public consultation

Wider developments - 2

• Universities UK: – problems with the current subscription system– practical benefits of institutional repositories– Supports RCUK efforts to promote open and unrestricted access

to research outputs

• The Russell Group:– publicly-funded research should be publicly available – current system of scholarly publishing does not always work in

the best interests of the research community– supports the development of institutional

repositories of research papers, and will actively encourage their researchers to deposit their work in them.

Process

• A final announcement is expected in November• No implications for Research Council grants in

October as originally proposed. Likely for grants awarded after early 2006.

• Consultation responses review by RCUK Research Outputs Information Group, chaired by Prof J Wood

• Recommendations to be considered by RCUK Executives Group

• Ongoing process of consultation and dialogue with stakeholders

• Review in 2008

Under development - 1

• Position statement with effect from 1 April 2006 for all grant applications

• Independent scientific study into the impact of open access to report in 2008 with support from key stakeholders

• Reconsideration of policy in 2008 based on the evidence provided by the study – Note: that it is extremely unlikely that there will be many deposits

before mid 2008 which result from research applications received by the Councils after April 2006

Under development - 2

• Refine current statement and develop implementation guidelines

• Discuss model copyright and licensing arrangements with key stakeholders– Is there a role here for the DTI research

communications forum ?

• Early 2006: workshop for learned societies on open access, Support from JISC, RCUK, RIN, the Science Council