APPENDIX 63
Memorandum from the National Library of
Scotland
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 National Library of Scotland: History
and background
The National Library of Scotland (NLS) has a
history of more than 300 years, being the successor to the historic
Library of the Faculty of Advocates, founded in the late seventeenth
century. By Act of Parliament in 1925 the Government accepted
the Faculty's offer to present its Library, with the exception
of the law books and manuscripts, to the nation to become the
National Library of Scotland.
Today the NLS is Scotland's largest library,
serving both as a general research library of international importance
and particularly for the people of Scotland, and the world's leading
repository for the printed and manuscript record of the country's
history and culture. It is funded by the Scottish Parliament and
is governed by a Board of Trustees.
Its special characteristics derive from its
status as a national and legal deposit library—the only
one in Scotland.
1.2 NLS: Vision and Mission, and Principal
Functions
In 2003 a new Vision and Mission was agreed
for the Library:
The National Library of Scotland will enrich
lives and communities, encouraging and promoting lifelong learning,
research and scholarship, and universal access to information
by comprehensively collecting and making available the recorded
knowledge of Scotland, and promoting access to the ideas and cultures
of the world.
NLS has five Principal Functions that will enable
it to achieve the Vision and Mission:
to create, preserve and ensure access to a comprehensive
collection of the recorded knowledge, culture and history of Scotland,
for the benefit of the people of Scotland and throughout the world;
to promote access to the recorded knowledge,
culture and history of the world, particularly for the people
of Scotland;
to preserve, ensure access to, promote and, where
appropriate, add to the National Library of Scotland's major historical
and heritage collections;
to encourage and support research and scholarship;
and
to provide support and leadership for the library
and information sector in Scotland.
1.3 Collection Development
1.3.1 Legal Deposit
The privilege of legal deposit was first granted
to the Advocates' Library in 1710, and confirmed by successive
copyright legislation. Under the terms of the National Library
of Scotland Act, 1925, the privilege was transferred to the National
Library. Law material received by deposit is retained by the Advocates'
Library, and users of the National Library have access to it through
the National Library's reading-rooms.
In October 2003, provisions of the Copyright
Act 1911 regarding the deposit of publications were replaced by
the Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003[213].
This gives the Secretary of State the power to extend the legal
deposit privilege to cover non-print media, including both hand-held
resources such as CD-ROMs, and online publications such as electronic
journals. It is understood, however, that it could be up to two
years before the first regulations required under the Act for
this extension can be put in place. Since January 2000 a code
of practice for the voluntary deposit of non-print publications
has operated which enables the Legal Deposit Libraries to request
deposit of certain categories of new media. NLS has taken primary
responsibility for requesting such materials published in Scotland.
In 2002-03 the Library acquired 231,216 items
through legal deposit and some 2,500 under the terms of the voluntary
code.
1.3.2 Purchase and Donation
The Library supplements its legal deposit intake
by purchase and donation in accordance with its collection development
policies (currently under review). This includes both British
and foreign non-print materials. The great majority of purchasing
is funded by the annual Purchase Grant received as grant-in-aid
from the Scottish Executive. This has remained static at £1.058m
for the past four years, and it is anticipated that it will remain
unchanged in 2004-05 and 2005-06. Funding is also available for
the purchase of specified types of material from the Library's
own Trust Funds, and grants are received, for example from the
Heritage Lottery Fund, towards the purchase of particular items
or collections.
1.4 Access
Under current regulations access to the National
Library is available to any individual who has a need to consult
the resources it holds and who cannot readily obtain these resources
elsewhere. Most material can be consulted in the General Reading
Room, where in addition to the usual facilities there are 40 computers
for public use. Readers in the Library can also plug in their
own lap-top machines. All printed library material must be consulted
on the premises, but photocopying is permitted under fair dealing
within the terms of the copyright legislation. Electronic databases
to which the Library subscribes are largely made available on
the Library's Electronic Resources Network. This, too, may only
be consulted on the premises. Some CD-ROM resources are networked,
others must be consulted on stand-alone PCs.
2. SCIENCE COLLECTIONS
IN THE
NATIONAL LIBRARY
OF SCOTLAND
The National Library of Scotland employs three
curatorial staff, all with part-time hours, to provide a Science
Information Service, to select new stock and to promote the science
collections.
2.1 Collection Development in Science
The scientific academic community is international
in its interests and publishing coverage. It is therefore necessary
to supplement the acquisition of UK publications obtained through
Legal Deposit by the purchase of scientific research publications
produced abroad.
Development of the science collections is considered
both in relation to the scientific information needs of the Scottish
science base[214],
and what has been deemed to be of particular relevance to the
Scottish economy. "Scotland's scientific capacity is one
of its prime assets and as such should be maintained and developed
to its full potential to encourage outputs that will enrich the
economic, social and environmental development of the people of
Scotland and beyond." [215].
Budgetary constraints compel purchasing decisions to be made in
the light of the strengths of other collections open to the public.
Areas such as Earth Sciences are well covered by the British Geological
Survey, for example, and Botany by the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
Priority areas are subject to change, but have been identified
as those such as electronics, engineering, environmental science,
biotechnology and aquaculture. A high priority is given to readers'
suggestions, and the Library aims, as far as possible, to fill
gaps in information provision, especially where these relate to
Scottish interest. Collaboration with other major academic, research
and public libraries has always been an important factor in the
Library's development of collections, and this continues. With
the increasing costs to all libraries however, it is not always
possible for the National Library to fill as many of the gaps
as are needed, and this is a source of anxiety to the Library,
and indeed to other professionals. A particular strain has been
placed on budgets by the excessive year-on-year inflation in the
prices of scientific periodicals, which greatly outstrips increases
in the RPI. This undermines the capability of libraries to purchase
adequately in the fields of humanities and social sciences, and
skews the balance of periodicals versus books in library collections.
2.1.1 Printed Collections
A significant proportion of printed material
arriving in the Library is of a scientific or technical nature.
Using its legal deposit privilege, the Library aims to stock all
scholarly scientific publications published in Britain. In 2003,
science accessions consisted of around 17,000 monographs and 10,000
current science journal titles. The majority of these are the
British publications, but the figures also include non-British
purchased and donated titles. The figures also include the foreign
titles received following an agreement in 1981 with the Royal
Society of Edinburgh (RSE). From its foundation in 1783, the RSE
had acquired a large and important collection of periodicals,
many of which were received by means of exchange of the Society's
publications with those of learned institutions all over the world.
Since 1981, the Library has maintained both this older collection
and the current exchanges.
2.1.2 Electronic Collections
Although scientific electronic resources have
been available in the Library since the 1980s, the Library has,
since 2001, had a policy of investing more heavily in its electronic
science collections. Chief among these has been a subscription
(£80,000 pa) to the Elsevier ScienceDirect service[216],
which indexes around 1,800 academic journal titles. A wide range
of subjects is covered, with full-text access to a large proportion
of the current titles. Other databases accessible in the Library
include: ISI Web of Science[217],
ISI Journal citation reports[218],
Ei Compendex[219],.
Environmental issues and policy index[220],
ILI Standards Infobase[221]
and Aquatic sciences and fisheries abstracts. [222]
3. RESPONSES
TO SPECIFIC
QUESTIONS
3.1 What impact do publishers' current policies
on pricing and provision of scientific journals, particularly
"big deal schemes", have on libraries and the teaching
and research communities they serve?
The National Library at present can claim all
British printed journals via legal deposit. Taking a "big
deal scheme" may well result in unwanted duplication and
would not be cost-effective. Moreover, other libraries take account
of NLS's legal deposit status when defining their own collecting
policies, and often depend on it both to fill gaps and to provide
the permanent archive.
Publishers have generally been unwilling to
offer to the National Library "big deal schemes" together
with the discount usually offered to academic libraries. Very
often commercial subscription rates are applicable, making them
too expensive for the Library to consider.
The National Library does not serve a distinct
teaching and research community and given the financial constraints
it must define its priorities in order to meet the requirements
of the largest proportion of users. For instance, the current
subscription to the entire Elsevier ScienceDirect service (at
a reduced rate for one year only) will enable the Library to determine
the most used sections to which it will subscribe in future years.
These schemes often involve licences for electronic
products which limit access to certain categories of users. In
academic libraries, this often restricts access to members of
the academic community only. Where in the past, retired academics
and private researchers may have been able to consult printed
resources in academic libraries, they are not usually entitled
to use electronic resources. These individuals then have to look
for alternative sources of information, and often expect the National
Library to provide them.
3.2 What action should Government, academic
institutions and publishers be taking to promote a competitive
market in scientific publications?
The National Library has always wished to promote
the highest degree of scholarship. It would therefore not want
to see the scenario where competition might lead to "dumbing
down"; where large publishing corporations more interested
in quantity than quality became the key players within scientific
publication. Many of the most important science journals are published
by small publishers; the Library would not wish to see them squeezed
out. The Government should continue to monitor the scientific
journals market, working where necessary with competition and
monopolies authorities of other governments.
3.3 What are the consequences of increasing
numbers of open-access journals, for example for the operation
of the Research Assessment Exercise and other selection processes?
Should the Government support such a trend and, if so, how?
The National Library welcomes more open availability
of scientific information, especially under initiatives such as
SPARC[223],
where peer review and levels of scholarship are maintained. "If
people have the opportunity to access scientific information they
will be better placed to make informed choices on issues that
affect them and allow them to influence others"[224].
The National Library of Scotland aims to ensure universal access
to information for Scotland's citizens. In particular, we believe
that scientific research which has been funded from the public
purse should be freely available. The government should support
Open Access publishing, and should initiate an inquiry into the
academic peer review process, with the aim of disengaging this
essential process from the operations of commercial publishers.
The Research Assessment Exercise, and the assessment of the work
of individual researchers should include a process of encouraging
researchers to publish in open access journals, subject to the
retention of the independently validation (peer review) process
in open access publications.
One concern in this process for the National
Library relates to its preservation and archival function. It
is vital that information published in open access journals is
stored and can be cited, indexed and retrieved for future reference—especially
if this scenario leads to the disappearance of the traditional
journal.
3.4 How effectively are the Legal Deposit
Libraries making available non-print scientific publications to
the research community, and what steps should they be taking in
this respect?
The National Library is eager to make its non-print
scientific holdings as widely available to the people of Scotland
as possible—not only to the research community, but also
to the general public. Current subscriptions are accessible on
NLS premises to all registered users. In order to register as
a user, an individual has only to establish a need to use material
not readily available to him/her elsewhere. The Library is not
therefore bound by a licence to allow access to a strictly defined
category of user. This contrasts with the situation in academic
libraries where licences usually limit access to members of that
academic community.
However, the Library is constrained by a number
of related problems. These are not unique to scientific publications,
but are at present particularly acute in that field.
3.4.1. Problems relating to publications
obtained through Legal Deposit
1. The fact that we are seeing a trend from
simultaneous print / online publishing through to online only.
The Library welcomes the recent Legal Deposit Libraries Act[225].
However the enabling legislation to allow the Library to request
non-print materials, especially on-line resources, may not be
in place for several years. In this interim period if publishers
are unwilling to deposit voluntarily, the Library will be required
to pay for material it received free when it was in print form,
or else cease to take it and accept having significant gaps in
its holdings.
2. Evidence from users' enquiries shows that
the public perception is that the Library has the right to claim
now, leading to the general expectation that many electronic resources
are, or ought to be, available in the Library.
3. Publishers often provide to subscribers
services such as simultaneous print and electronic versions of
their publications or value-added services (eg searching of archives,
indexes, cumulations, updates, links to supplementary material).
These are deemed not to be applicable to legal deposit libraries,
since these libraries are not paying a subscription. This means
that for a British publication, such as a journal, only the most
basic print version can be provided unless additional payment
is made—usually the full cost of the institutional subscription.
4. The issues of storage and archiving of
the data provided in such electronic resources remains to be addressed
by the Library. It is likely that instead of retaining everything
received, which has tended to be the policy of the Library in
the past, NLS will be able to collaborate with other depositories
and may take full responsibility for only certain types of electronic
publication. At the most basic level, this could extend to Scottish
material only, or that with Scottish content. It will be important
to ensure that through such collaboration the full range of information
continues to be available to future scholars.
3.4.2. Problems relating to publications
obtained through purchase
1. The cost of such resources, exacerbated
by the fact that no academic (or other) discounts seem to apply
to the Library, which is usually expected to pay commercial subscription
rates.
2. The fact that the non-print format attracts
VAT, adding an extra charge to subscriptions which cannot at present
be reclaimed.
3. The Library is keen that its users should
both have access to material which is only available electronically,
and also benefit from the improvements the technology can provide
in terms of searching and access. The extent to which it can do
so is limited by the finances available. The case has already
been made to the Scottish Executive, the Library's funding body,
for a significant increase to the annual Purchase Grant. However,
early indications about the forthcoming Comprehensive Spending
Review are not encouraging.
4. The Library has been actively pursuing
publishers of databases to which it subscribes to provide passwords
to allow Library users remote access. Publishers are not so far
prepared to grant this facility, and will only permit their resources
to be consulted "on-site". One representative from a
provider said that his company has "a large commercial interest,
and is therefore wary of letting passwords get into the wrong
hands". This contrasts with the situation in academic libraries
which have means of issuing remote access passwords to all their
authenticated users. Transport and communication problems particular
to Scotland because of its geography mean that members of the
general public in large areas of the country cannot, without coming
to Edinburgh, gain access to the resources the Library has, and
which they cannot have access to through a higher education body.
Printing out from on-line resources is generally only allowed
on-site by licence restrictions. It is frustrating that the Library
is prevented from exploiting fully the technology to satisfy the
needs of its users and potential users through remote access to
electronic resources.
5. Sometimes it is more cost-effective to
provide "pay-as-you-go" access to certain infrequently
used yet important databases. These services tend to be expensive
for a single search, and the Library has to decide, based on usage
pattern, whether any of the cost should be passed on to the reader.
This leads to discrimination in terms of ability to pay.
3.4.3 Despite these financial and commercial
constraints the Library is committed to making its electronic
resources available more effectively:
1. by promoting the services on the Library
website[226],
on posters, in information to personal users and direct contact
with librarians of other institutions;
2. by identifying gaps in information provision
and providing alternative access where possible. One example here
was Chemical abstracts. For many years, the Library subscribed
to the print edition. The cost eventually became too high to justify
the subscription. A small number of readers voiced their dissatisfaction.
The solution has been to subscribe to the STN[227]
"pay-as-you-go" service, which has proved to be much
more cost-effective;
3. by collaboration with other institutions
eg Scottish Confederation of University and Research Libraries
Science Information Strategy Working Group, the NHS E-Library,
local academic libraries, public libraries;
4. by continuing to make the case with publishers
for remote access within agreed limits;
5. by negotiating as good a deal as possible,
and exploring the scope for consortial purchase or subscription.
3.5 What impact will trends in academic journal
publishing have on the risks of scientific fraud and malpractice?
As long as the well-respected peer review process
contained in the dissemination of scientific information continues,
and is incorporated into the new publishing methods such as Open
Access journals, these risks will be minimized. The Library would
see the danger arising not so much from academic journals but
from the vast amount of unsubstantiated information available
freely on the Internet. While the Library and its staff cannot
exert any sort of censorship, it is incumbent upon it to ensure
access to reputable information, especially for the general public
with little or no other access to this sort of information. Library
staff would then always take steps to provide and promote authenticated
resources.
4. RECOMMENDATIONS
1. Secondary legislation to implement the
Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003 should be brought in as quickly
as possible.
2. Publishers of electronic resources should
be encouraged by government to provide a degree of remote access
for registered library users of public and national libraries,
ideally through national licences which, in Scotland, it would
be appropriate for the National Library to lead in co-operation
with other interested libraries.
3. The funding bodies which support major
research libraries should take cognisance of the fact that high
inflation rates in the prices of periodicals, unless reflected
in the libraries' purchase grants, limit the ability of libraries
to meet the needs of researchers.
4. The Government should remove VAT from
electronic publications.
5. The Government should seek methods of
encouraging small publishers, and should continue to monitor the
scientific journals market, working where necessary with competition
and monopolies authorities of other governments.
6. The Government should encourage researchers
to publish in Open Access journals and should instigate an inquiry
into methods of disengaging the peer review process from commercial
concerns.
February 2004
213 Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003. http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2003/20030028.htm
Website viewed on 3 Feb 2004. Back
214
SCOTTISH SCIENCE ADVISORY COMMITTEE. Science matters : making
the right connections for Scotland : first report of the Scottish
Science Advisory Committee. Edinburgh : The Committee, 2004. www.scottishscience.org.uk.
Section 4.1, page 26. Back
215
SCOTTISH SCIENCE ADVISORY COMMITTEE. Science matters : making
the right connections for Scotland : first report of the Scottish
Science Advisory Committee. Edinburgh : The Committee, 2004. www.scottishscience.org.uk.
Section 2.4, page 14. Back
216
ELSEVIER B. V. ScienceDirect. www.sciencedirect.com Website
viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
217
ISI Web of science. http://isi10.newisiknowledge.com/portal.cgi
Website viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
218
ISI Journal citation reports. http://isi10.newisiknowledge.com/portal.cgi
Website viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
219
THOMSON Dialog@site. Ei Compendex. http://www.dialogatsite.com/
Website viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
220
EBSCO. Environmental issues and policy index. http://search.epnet.com/
Website viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
221
ILI Standards infobase. http://www.ili.co.uk/en/ Website viewed
on 4 Feb 2004. Back
222
CAMBRIDGE SCIENTIFIC ABSTRACTS. Aquatic sciences and fisheries
abstracts. www.csa.com Website viewed on 8 Jan 2004. Back
223
SCHOLARLY PUBLISHING AND ACADEMIC RESOURCES COALITION. [SPARC
home page]. http://www.arl.org/sparc/home/index.asp?page=0 Website
viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
224
SCOTTISH EXECUTIVE. A science strategy for Scotland. Edinburgh
: The Stationery Office, 2001. www.scotland.gov, pg 40. Back
225
Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003. http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2003/20030028.htm
Website viewed on 3 Feb 2004. Back
226
NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND. [Website home page]. www.nls.uk.
Viewed on 4 Feb 2004. Back
227
as above. Back
| 
