Open Access in the UK and Europe-the Finch Report et al

“The Finch Report and its subsequent responses from RCUK, the UK government, and the European Commission have further stimulated an already lively debate in the UK and Europe on the subject of open access. Although many disagree with various aspects of the report and its responses, everyone can agree that creating policy is terribly messy, involving consensus and compromise, where, by its very nature, not every side will get exactly what they want. Clearly there is no perfect solution for how best to implement open access otherwise we'd already be there. Without losing sight of the forest for the trees, the UK should be acknowledged for its success in implementing a national open access mandate for publicly funded research, a specific policy on how to accomplish this, and fostering an engaged public debate.  he Finch Report (executive summary; full report) released on June 18, laid out far-reaching recommendations for the UK on managing the transition to Open Access...  The report favors Gold OA, recommending that ‘a clear policy direction should be set towards support for publication in open access or hybrid journals, funded by APCs [Author Processing Charges], as the main vehicle for the publication of research.’ Such a move is not without cost - the report estimates the group's recommendations would cost the UK £50-60m annually during the Transition Period (defined as two years), with £38m going toward APC charges, and includes an economic model (Annex E) that estimates total costs at various APC cost levels and at different rates of global Gold OA adoption. The model assumes that during the Transition Period journal subscription costs will decrease proportionately as more journals become fully Gold OA (i.e. not hybrid)... the group predicts that market competition among journals for status will keep APC costs reasonable, ultimately resulting in significant cost savings for academic institutions, and that libraries and others can further keep costs in line by leveraging their power as purchasers ... In response to the Finch Report, Britain's chief academic research funding agency, RCUK, announced on July 16 a new OA mandate for research wholly or partially fund[ed] by the council.  The policy impacts peer-reviewed research articles or conference proceedings submitted for publication beginning April 1, 2013. RCUK echoes the Finch Report's preference for Gold OA, requiring authors and journals to publish using the APC model. Green OA can only be used when Gold is not an option. The policy sets an embargo period of 6 months for science publications and 12 months for humanities and social sciences publications (whereas Finch recommended 12 months for all research). Re-use rights are granted for both Gold and Green, and Gold articles are specifically required to use the Creative Commons CC-BY license... RCUK restructured its funding scheme so that money for APCs will come from block grants and go to institutional publication funds... A few hours after the RCUK announcement on July 16, David Willetts, the UK Minister of State for Universities and Science and convener of the Finch group, announced the UK government's support for all of the Finch recommendations...  The Higher Education Funding Council for England is also investigating how best to implement ‘a requirement that research outputs submitted to a REF or similar exercise after 2014 shall be as widely accessible as may be reasonably achievable at the time.’  More significantly, the European Commission (EC) announced on July 17 that ‘100% of scientific publications resulting from Horizon 2020 will be available under open access.’ This plan, which applies to €80b of European research funding from 2014-2020, sees both Gold and Green models as valid approaches and also grants re-use rights... Many have criticized Finch and the subsequent policies...