Government action
183. We received many calls for publishing in an
author-pays journal to be made mandatory under the terms of research
grants awarded from public funds. The World Summit on the Information
Society (WSIS), for example, argued that "concerning the
policy that should be adopted by funding entities, it is clear
that because of sheer inertia, or because of fear of retribution
from publishers, a compulsory policy must be adopted".[323]
Whilst we do not believe that there is sufficient evidence to
support the implementation of a Government mandate, we do not
see this as an excuse for the current lack of any coherent Government
policy on author-pays publishing.
184. In oral evidence, the DGRC told us that a decision
in favour of the author-pays model would be "a pretty brave
decision" for a government to take at this stage.[324]
Some Government agencies have been less cautious, however. The
Food Standards Agency was recently reported to be "moving
towards actively supporting open access publication of the research
it commissions".[325]
Similarly, JISC has implemented two schemes to encourage experimentation
with the author-pays publishing model. In December 2003, it announced
a funding programme to offer short-term funding, or seed money,
of £150,000 to publishers to make journals freely available
on the internet using open access models. In a press release it
announced that "the money is to encourage them to switch
'from the traditional subscription method to a model where authors
have to pay to have papers published'. The result of this is that
research journals will become freely available on the web for
everyone in further and higher education and beyond to benefit
from". [326]
In June 2003, JISC announced a membership deal with BioMed Central.
Under the terms of the deal, from 1 July 2003, article-processing
charges were waived for all UK higher education staff when publishing
in any of BioMed Central's journals. The deal cost £85,000
in the first year, and will cost £80,000 next year.[327]
We strongly support further experimentation with the author-pays
publishing model. In the short term Government may need to provide
limited financial assistance to encourage publishers and institutions
to take part in what, for them, may be an expensive process. We
applaud the Joint Information Systems Committee for providing
funding for this purpose so far and hope that it will continue
to do so.
185. A wholescale transition to the author-pays publishing
model would have profound implications for current funding structures,
necessitating the transfer of funds between DfES and OST. Much
of the evidence agrees that the author-pays publication model
will become more prevalent, even if it does not replace the current
publishing model, in the UK and globally. It is therefore likely
that the UK STM publishing market will have to sustain a mixed
economy for some time. This would be likely to prove costly for
publishers, research funders and libraries alike. Given the scale
of the financial impact of the new publishing model, whether or
not it prevails, we expected that the Government would have conducted
impact assessments and formulated a strategy. In oral evidence,
Government agreed that this was a necessary step. The DGRC told
us that "there ought to be a policy put together jointly
between DfES, OST/DTI and DCMS".[328]
We agree wholeheartedly. There is, however, scant evidence as
yet of the departments involved working together on this issue.
Author-pays publishing is a growing phenomenon. Its implementation
on any scale will have important consequences for current funding
structures and the UK publishing industry. So far the Government
has shown little inclination to address this issue.
186. Government has not shown much evidence of
a joined-up approach to the challenges posed by changes to the
model for scientific publishing. Whilst the central departments
have been slow to respond to the author-pays publishing model,
at least two Government-funded bodies have given public support
to it. This creates unnecessary confusion. We recommend that it
formulate a coherent strategy as a matter of urgency.
187. This inquiry took place against the backdrop
of an already lively debate. It soon became apparent to us, however,
that discussions mostly tended to take place within separate interest
groups. The relative lack of discussion between these groups has
hindered any assessment of the potential impact of the author-pays
publishing model and has prevented any sort of consensus view
from emerging. Government has a role to play in bringing together
policy-makers, funding bodies, publishers, librarians and academics
to discuss the issues in a constructive way.
Can the UK act alone?
188. The UK writes more articles than it reads. As
a consequence of this, Reed Elsevier claims that a Government
mandate for open access would be against the UK's financial interests:
"while Britain's spending on journal subscriptions currently
amounts to 3.3% of the world's total, UK researchers contribute
a much higher 5% of all articles published globally. As a result,
we estimate that the UK Government, foundations, universities
and researchers could together pay 30-50% more for STM journals
in an Open Access system than they do today".[329]
This statement can, of course, be inverted. Compared to its share
of global STM research, the UK is currently paying proportionally
less to access the research findings of other countries. Countries
with lower research outputs, particularly in the developing world,
are, on the other hand, paying proportionally more to access the
same findings, a phenomenon which acts as a brake on further development.
One of the main advantages of an author-pays system is that publication
costs would scale with research costs: countries which invest
greater amounts in research would pay more to see that research
translated into outputs. Author-pays publishing would ensure that
countries were paying an amount for publication that was commensurate
with their total research spend. We are satisfied that, by
scaling publication with research costs, the author-pays publishing
model would ensure a fairer global distribution of the costs of
publishing research findings.
189. A more immediate problem is the impact on the
UK of a hybrid global publications market. Author-pays and subscriber-pays
publishing models are alternatives: costs are met through publication
or subscription charges. If the UK were to adopt a policy
in favour of author-pays publishing, it would be at a financial
disadvantage unless others acted in the same way. By acting alone,
the UK would assume the full costs of publication for all its
publicly-funded researchers. The resulting articles would be exported
abroad where they could be read free of charge. This would increase
the impact of UK research. Yet UK scientists also need access
to global research. Thus the UK would still have to pay for subscriptions
to journal articles originating abroad. We asked PloS how it would
respond to this problem. It answered that "if the UK were
the only country to make such a mandate, it would also have to
pay to access the works of scientists from other countries, but
this would be a separate expense for a different purpose".[330]
This answer does not alter the fact that, by paying both to publish
and to read articles, the UK would be investing greater sums in
the publishing process than is currently the case. The UK would
put itself at a financial disadvantage internationally if it were
to act alone in mandating publicly-funded researchers to publish
in author-pays journals.
Conclusions on the author-pays
publishing model
190. The arguments for the author-pays publishing
model are in many ways attractive despite some difficulties which
require resolution, and we believe that its implementation would
yield many benefits for the global research community. The endeavours
of author-pays publishers such as PLoS and BioMed Central to widen
access to scientific publications are admirable and they are to
be commended for the vigour with which they have pursued their
aims. We have recommended that funds be made available from Research
Council budgets for those authors that wish to do so to publish
in journals that impose publication charges.
191. We are satisfied that the implementation of
an author-pays publishing model would not compromise peer review
at the higher end of the market because it would not be in the
interests of the publishers concerned to allow this to happen.
We do, however, have concerns about free-riders and the potential
impact of the new publishing model on learned societies. For this
reason, we have recommended that the Government conduct a study
and facilitate further experiments to ascertain what the likely
impact of the author-pays publishing model will be. We hope that,
subject to the resolution of these problems, the conditions can
be created so that the author-pays model and other new publishing
models can be allowed to flourish, to demonstrate whether or not
they are sustainable and to confer their anticipated benefits.
This aspiration should be viewed in the context of the current
situation, which, as we have explained, is unsatisfactory. We
have recommended that Government prepare for change in the formulation
of a comprehensive strategy.
262 Q 164, Vitek Tracz Back
263
Ev 270 Back
264
As above. Back
265
Ev 275 and Wellcome Trust, Costs and business models in scientific
research publishing, p 2 Back
266
Q 328 Back
267
Oxford University Press, "Experimenting with Open Access
publishing", www3.oup.co.uk Back
268
Wellcome Trust, Costs and business models in scientific research
publishing, p 2 Back
269
The British Medical Journal, 8 May, 2004;328:1094 Back
270
Q 164, Vitek Tracz Back
271
Ev 130 Back
272
Ev 194 Back
273
Q 8 Back
274
Ev 147 Back
275
Ev 146 Back
276
Ev 276 Back
277
www.biomedcentral.com Back
278
Q 359 Back
279
Theodore C. Bergstrom and Carl T. Bergstrom, "Can 'author-pays'
journals compete with 'reader pays'?", 20 May 2004, www.nature.com Back
280
The Wellcome Trust, Costs and business models in scientific publishing,
p 18 Back
281
Ev 165 Back
282
Ev 270 Back
283
Q 65 Back
284
Ev 71 Back
285
Ev 381 Back
286
Ev 126 Back
287
Oxford University Press, "Experimenting with Open Access
publishing", www3.oup.co.uk Back
288
www3.oup.co.uk Back
289
Ev 310 Back
290
Thomson ISI, The Impact of Open Access Journals, April
2004, pp 2, 10 Back
291
Ev 306 Back
292
Q 164 Back
293
Ev 296-7 Back
294
Q 330 Back
295
Ev 78 Back
296
Ev 91 Back
297
Ev 72 Back
298
Ev 275 Back
299
Oxford University Press, "Experimenting with Open Access
publishing", www3.oup.co.uk Back
300
Ev 454 Back
301
Ev 306 Back
302
Q 165 Back
303
Q 321 Back
304
Ev 126 Back
305
Q 65 Back
306
Ev 307 Back
307
Ev 140 Back
308
Ev 179 Back
309
Q 167 Back
310
Q 65; Ev 200 Back
311
Ev 423 Back
312
Ev 179 Back
313
Q 179 Back
314
Ev 451 Back
315
Ev 229 Back
316
Ev 175 Back
317
Ev 448 Back
318
Ev 310 Back
319
Ev 63 Back
320
Q 280 Back
321
Ev 227 Back
322
Ev 268 Back
323
Ev 292 Back
324
Q 354 Back
325
"Food Standards Agency gives solid support to open access",
Research Fortnight, 23 June 2004 Back
326
www.jisc.ac.uk Back
327
Ev 462 Back
328
Q 349 Back
329
Ev 194 Back
330
Ev 452 Back