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Scientific Publications: Free for all?

: That is not true. I will refer to the reasons why in a moment. To advance their careers, academics compete with each other for a place to publish in the journals with greatest impact—the journals that are most read and most cross-referenced by others in their profession. That drives the cost of those journals higher and higher. The research assessment exercise has not helped with that problem. That sort of competition is most intensive in the science, engineering and technological areas, including the medical sciences. In the light of those facts, Professor Katritzky launched a not-for-profit organisation called ARKAT-USA Inc. Foundation, which, in January 2000, launched the internet version of the journal to which I have just referred. That was made possible—as I said earlier, nothing is for free—through an initial donation from a benefactor, and it is self-generating today by the generosity of people who want to support it. In the past few months, the innovation has gone one step further, because a hard-copy issue is now available, just at the cost of production—$20 per issue—and it is circulated by the famous internet company, Amazon. Today, that journal is self-supporting, partly due to the benefactors but also due to the fact that scores of organic chemists contribute towards editing it, peer-reviewing its papers, and providing the technical editorship that is necessary for it to appear in that high quality format. It is a high quality journal; journals will not survive unless they are produced to a high quality, with good peer reviews and with few bad papers in them for that reason. The author pays online model is growing in acceptability, otherwise we would not be having this debate. However, as has already been pointed out, that loads costs on to funding organisations. The hon. Member for Wantage said that it loads costs on to the authors, but I should like to knock that idea on the head straight away. Very few authors of scientific publications pay out of their own pockets. It is the funding organisations that pay: organisations such as the research councils. However, as the hon. Gentleman implied, it does shift costs away from libraries on to research budgets. Research Councils UK does not appear to have the money to allow that shift to occur. I also doubt that universities will shift costs away from hard-pressed libraries on to equally hard-pressed research departments. Researchers supported by charities cannot currently meet all the costs of their academic research and so the author pays model is bad for people who use charitable money to carry out their research. There is some controversy about whether that model—the author pays model—is cheaper than the most common subscriber pays model. The Wellcome Trust claims that it is 30 per cent. cheaper, and others agree, but a number of people strongly disagree with that, among which the Royal Society has been mentioned. Of course, wherever money is charged for doing something, there must be quite a number of administrators to collect the money. Therefore, in my opinion, it does not significantly reduce the costs compared with subscriber pays models. The Government are also not convinced that the author pays model is superior to the current subscriber pays model. They say that they want to provide a level playing field so that market forces can provide a solution to the problem. The Committee, of which I am a member, does not agree with that statement by the Government—I agree with the Committee, and perhaps will explain why later. The author pays model is probably not acceptable to scientists working in developing countries either, because they will not be able to find the money unless the journal concerned waives the costs. Someone in the debate has already said that that is a rather patronising attitude. In the past, the costs of hard-copy journals were kept down by the author pays model, but that model still incurs the costs of printing and distribution of the journals, or of setting up and maintaining a website. The higher the rejection rates for papers, the higher the publication costs. Nature Publishing Group rejects some 90 per cent. of the papers submitted to it. That is a phenomenal cost to be loaded on to the publication of that high-impact journal, in which my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, North (Dr. Gibson) has had the pleasure of publishing. It claims that the author pays model would entail a cost of between £5,500 and £16,500 per article, depending on length. That is a phenomenal publication cost. Some scientists also feel that the author pays model will lower the quality of published papers, especially in commercially produced journals. Obviously, to maximise profits it is in their interest to publish as many papers as possible under that model. That would be a backward step.