UK government to push for open access to publicly funded research

In a move that is being seen as revolutionary, the British government has come out in support of the idea that all publicly funded scientific research must be published in open-access journals.

The new policy was spelt out in the government document, Innovation and Research Strategy for Growth published this Monday. It also includes plans for a series of cash prizes for teams for solving specific scientific challenges and a new £75-million fund for small businesses for developing their ideas into commercial products.

The commitment towards open access to publicly funded research comes as a direct challenge to the business models of the big academic publishing companies, that serve as gatekeepers for the majority of high-quality scientific research. Earlier attempts by open access publishers to end the stranglehold over the dissemination of scientific results had not met with success.

The strategy sums up the coalition's work over the past 18 months, on reshaping and developing the UK's science base amid the economic crisis. It follows a few days after David Cameron's speech calling for increased research collaboration between the NHS and the life sciences industry, including a £180 million "catalyst fund" for universities and companies to help develop projects until they attracted outside investment.

According to science minister David Willetts, who spoke at a briefing to launch the government strategy, the government's starting point was a commitment by the coalition to transparency and open access to publicly funded data.

He added , the government set out clearly in the document today, its commitment to open access. He added the government wanted to move to open access but in a way that ensured that peer review and publishing continued as a function. He said it needed to be paid for somehow and one of the clear options was to shift to a system from which university libraries paid for journals to one in which the academics paid to publish.