Dame Lynne Brindley challenges Government on Digital Britain
21 January 2009
Chief Executive of the British Library calls for a coherent UK national digital strategy to include mass digitisation of content and digital literacy skills
Dame Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library, last night challenged the Government that its vision of a 'Digital Britain' must include the "critical public service" of preserving Digital Britain's collective memory; digitising the "goldmine of content" within the British Library; and ensuring "digital literacy for all.the skills we need as a nation to prosper in the digital world."
Speaking alongside Digital Inclusion Minister, Paul Murphy MP, to an audience of policy makers and Government officials, she argued that: "The UK is now reaping the benefit of systematic public investment in its rich heritage over centuries. But continuing investment is needed to guarantee future dividends."
She welcomed a range of current Government initiatives - from the Digital Inclusion Action Plan to Lord Carter's Digital Britain initiative - but outlined a number of significant areas in which the British Library has a major contribution to make:
- the further development of its own historic role as public custodian and guarantor of sustainable access to quality content;
- the digitisation of "legacy" content - such as manuscripts, books and newspapers - on a mass scale;
- the promotion of widespread digital literacy skills to ensure that current and future generations of researchers are best able to exploit the wealth of information resources at their disposal.
Dame Lynne said, "The British Library can help deliver a truly digital future for Britain by growing faster its role as custodian of Digital Britain's collective memory - acquisition of digital content, ensuring its sustainability and its continuing access and long-term preservation - a critical public service that acts as a springboard for research, new forms of creativity and knowledge creation. Without such effort and investment future researchers and citizens will find a black hole in the knowledge base of the 21st Century, and without such guaranteed long-term commitment to preservation, our content and creative industries will be inhibited in their global market success."
Dame Lynne continued, "We are sitting on a goldmine of content which should be within a coherent UK national digital strategy. To support Digital Britain we need to deliver a critical mass of digital content. Public investment is imperative if we are to achieve the returns that a digital society demands. Access to a digitised British Library ought to be the right of every citizen, every household, every child, every school and public library, universities and business. That's a vision worth delivering on."
Dame Lynne also called for a focus on digital literacy skills. "We may get the plumbing (broadband) and we may get the poetry (new content) envisaged by Lord Carter, but if we do not have proficiency to exploit the opportunities, such investment will be wasted. We need digital literacy for all - the skills we need as a nation to prosper in the digital world."
She concluded: "We need joined-up policy-making and leadership; we need imaginative partnerships and business models across the public and private sectors; and we need to do all we can to sustain creativity and its underpinning infrastructures to ensure UK global economic success well beyond the recession."
For more information please contact Ben Sanderson at the British Library Press Office, ben.sanderson@bl.uk T: +44 (0)20 7412 7111 M: +44 (0)78100 56848
Notes to Editors
1. Digital Britain: are we making the investment we need to succeed? featuredkeynote speeches from Dame Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library and Paul Murphy MP, Digital Inclusion Minister plus a Q&A discussion on the UK's digital future, with distinguished panel including Derek Wyatt MP, Emily Bell (Media Editor of The Guardian), Tom Loosemore (C4IP) and Andrew Pinder CBE. The event was at 6.30pm in the Attlee Suite, Portcullis House, Westminster.
2. A podcast of the event will be made available on the British Library website.
3. The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and one of the world's greatest research libraries. It provides world class information services to the academic, business, research and scientific communities and offers unparalleled access to the world's largest and most comprehensive research collection. The Library's collection has developed over 250 years and exceeds 150 million separate items representing every age of written civilisation. It includes: books, journals, manuscripts, maps, stamps, music, patents, newspapers and sound recordings in all written and spoken languages. Further information is available on the Library's website at www.bl.uk.
See our award-winning online Annual Report at: www.bl.uk/knowledge