Copyright Licensing Agency relaxes copyright licence rules to support sector through COVID-19 crisis. UK higher education institutions have been given greater access to scanned book content and can also copy an increased amount from many print books.

London, 14 April 2020: CLA is delighted to announce that following consultation with its Members and educational publishers, we will be temporarily relaxing key terms of the Higher Education Licence, to give academics, libraries and students increased access to learning resources during this difficult period and until institutions re-open as normal.

There are two important changes:

• We have relaxed the requirement for an HEI to own an original copy of a book so they can now make use of any extract held in our Digital Content Store (DCS) or an original copy owned by an academic.
• We have increased the extent limit for copying from print books so institutions can copy up to 30% or 3 chapters, whichever is the greater, compared to the usual 10% or 1 chapter. This applies to books published by participating publishers only.

Both amendments apply only where a digital edition is not available through commercial channels and continues until the earlier of the return to normality, or 30 June 2020.

Philip Hearne, CLA Director of Education, commented: “We recognise the difficult time UK universities are having and we are delighted to announce this support package today, due to swift backing from our Members and the publishers, authors and visual artists they represent. These temporary measures will improve availability of book content for staff and students over this difficult period.”

David Anderson-Evans, Chair of UUK/Guild HE Copyright Negotiating and Advisory Committee (CNAC), said: “Although the coronavirus pandemic has presented higher education institutions in the UK with an unprecedented challenge, the CLA response has been extremely positive. The measures they have taken will be of considerable assistance to HEIs at this time. On their behalf the CNAC wishes to thank the CLA, its rights holders, members and education publishers for their understanding and willingness to provide this support.”

James Bennett, Head of Rights and Licensing at CLA, added: “We are pleased to have been able to work constructively with CNAC, listening to the sector’s challenges and developing a targeted response supported by rightsholders.”

This unprecedented initiative from CLA and its members, especially acknowledging the generous support of educational publishers, will provide the much-needed help that our higher education customers need to deliver remote learning.

Full details of the changes and applicable conditions plus a list of the participating publishers, can be found on the CLA website https://cla.co.uk/he-covid19
For more information, please contact: Paul Rollins pr@cla.co.uk or 020 7400 3140.