'Libraries: explore and discover'
Australian Library Week Oration
13 May 1999
Warren Horton
I am grateful to the Australian Library and Information Association for the invitation to deliver this 1999 Australian Library Week Oration today. And indeed I am also charmed by it being delivered in Parliament House. When I was young my main ambition was to go into politics. This did not happen for a number of reasons, but I confess to being a passionate political junkie. The close involvement with politicians over the last two decades has been a fascinating and enjoyable part of my work, and I have considerable respect for the commitment most bring to the Parliament. However it has been frustrating too, especially when I appear before Senate Estimates Committees yet am restricted from major speeches! How nice to have this time today to speak about some subjects which matter to me at length. But I will of course freely handle interjections from any other frustrated junkies in the room.
The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary defines the word oration as meaning 'a prayer or petition to God' and 'A formal speech or discourse; esp. one delivered in connection with some particular occasion.' The former definition is now obsolete, and the latter precisely what the Association had in mind when it established this annual oration in 1996. Australian Library Week celebrates the importance of libraries to Australian culture, intellectual life, and education. There are few Australians whose lives have not been significantly enriched by access to libraries at some time. Libraries are the most used community resource. The joint Australia Council and Australian Bureau of Statistics publication Public attitudes to the Arts, Australia of November 1997 notes that 95.4 per cent of the population consider libraries important or very important, while 90.7 per cent believe libraries should receive government funding. More Australians visit libraries than any other cultural events.
Libraries liberate the mind, they excite and encourage imagination, and for many people they underpin life-long learning. And all this is achieved at relatively little cost - it is ironic that Australia spends almost twice the money on gaols in which we lock people up than on public libraries, used by over 50 per cent of the public.
I am also very proud to have this invitation from the Association, since libraries have been the central interest in my life, and my passion, since I commenced work in the State Library of New South Wales on 25 March 1957. I am pleased at what I in association with many others have achieved in that time, but especially in this Association and representing it and Australian librarianship overseas since I came to Canberra in 1985. I am finishing my working career in two months at a most exciting time for libraries, and the Australian people who use them. Technology and telecommunication developments, but most importantly the internet, are reshaping the information environment in which they operate. Australia has much to gain from these developments, but also much to contribute by example to the emerging global library. Our professional thinking, and level of library service even with resource constraints, is world-class in standard. We should be very proud of this.
Sir Anthony Mason, who then chaired the National Library of Australia Council, delivered the Inaugural Oration, on 1 May 1996 in the State Library of New South Wales. Sir Anthony spoke about the role of libraries as a treasury of knowledge and the possible impact of restriction on the free flow of knowledge, information and ideas as the copyright debate was played out. This debate three years later rages more strongly and with more passion than anyone perhaps then imagined. Allied to it now is the debate about the impact of access to the wealth of information available through the internet. The Government's decision to regulate online services, and the recent hearings in this building by the Senate Information Technologies Committee on the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Online Services) Bill 1999 have been the subject of much recent media comment.
These matters, and the principles involved, are of great interest to me, and I want to further discuss them in this year's Oration. This had not been my original intention, and indeed I have recast this paper in recent days. But principles matter, and are not talked about enough in our profession, especially in the last decade where resources and funding cuts have been such a preoccupation. I was also surprised at the reaction during recent Senate Select Committee hearings to what I thought unexceptionable comments by my colleague Jennefer Nicholson, the acting executive director of the Association, which caused me to again explore my own views.
While discussing these issues, I must say that I think much of the debate about them will prove to be of nothing but academic interest a decade from now. We are in the midst of a paradigm shift in technology and telecommunications where the survival of collected human memory is at risk. The sheer amount of digitised information of recent years, and the dynamics of the information exchange process, mean we have lost control, for the first time since the invention of print, of any serious capacity to permanently store the record of intellectual life and human endeavour. So much debate in recent weeks has gone into issues of content control and blocking technologies for the internet, rather than how we preserve the valuable digital information delivered through it that we are losing every day. Convergence of telecommunications means in any case that control of content will soon be almost impossible.
Professor Robin Williams, Dean of the Faculty of Art, Design and Communication in RMIT University, has recently impressed me with comments on the internet and its wider implications. This was in an address to the Virtual Opportunity Congress at Parliament House, Melbourne in October last year. He noted that it is sobering to remember that the total on-line population of one hundred and fifty million represents less than three per cent of the world's population, and that the world's off-line population grows faster than its on-line counterpart. But he also made the following perceptive comments on how citizens will access and use these technologies:
'The net will increasingly involve a growing proportion of the population in active governance. Their feeling of empowerment will spread to other areas of their lives. The internet acts as a powerful lever for people to accomplish their goals. It's more than a source of empowering information; it's a way for people to organise themselves ... .
The internet can be an immensely powerful tool for the development of community; because it supports the very thing that creates a community - human interaction. The strange phenomenon of the internet is that it enables the formation of communities independent of geography. Eventually there will be a global society of 'the connected' laid over the more traditional communities. This global culture will probably offend the sensibilities of many who see it as some homogenizing process leading to a kind of International McDonalds culture. However many parts of local culture can be easily transferred to the net and we are increasingly seeing the Web used as a mechanism for re-affirming language and social values in alienated, exiled or besieged peoples ... .
It seems therefore that global networked communications offer the prospect of: empowering young and old, strengthening family relationships, rebuilding dysfunctional lives, protecting and celebrating cultural differences and building global understanding through distributed communities.
It is ironic however that these global communications networks may actually have the most empowering effects on those groups that are least able to access them.'
A colleague with whom I discussed this Professor William's comments remarked that she thought the internet also highlighted how many lonely people there were in the world, demonstrated in the various chat sites alone, and that it could have the effect of exacerbating this in a modern society. This jolted me, but I on balance still accept the thrust of what Williams is saying.
The most empowering impact of the internet that I have seen was at the Annual Conference of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, the world body for librarianship, in Beijing in August 1996. The Chinese organising committee had in negotiations over the previous three years, in which I was very involved, been deeply concerned about how IFLA would handle debate on intellectual freedom issues during the Conference. They became almost paranoid when IFLA demanded an internet room for delegates, then becoming the norm at international conferences, and in the end we had such a room for foreign delegates only, with entry heavily controlled by security people. But Chinese delegates milled around the room, restless to talk about the internet, eager to explore its potential, and very conscious how much it offered access to Western ideas and information. We all left China very conscious, as is being proved there now, that it is impossible to contain access to the internet, even where only available initially in libraries and educational institutions with controlled access.
The capacity of the internet to deliver such volumes of information, and the capacity of people to so easily place content on it, has led to the present debate over content. Libraries, because of their central role in the provision of information, sit squarely in this debate. But they also do this because of the strong position the library profession has traditionally taken over issues of intellectual freedom, including access, free service, professional ethics and censorship. The issues involved in this debate are potentially far broader than possible control of pornography and other content, but unfortunately the debate is usually narrowly-framed against this alone.
This Association, and the Australian profession in general, has a strong corpus of shared and well articulated principles directly relevant to this debate, but largely based upon the world of print. These include the important Statement on freedom to read, first adopted in 1971. I remember vividly the circumstances where attempts by a small Sydney municipal council to direct content in the library led to its adoption.
This Statement begins with the ringing sentence, which I strongly support, that 'freedom can be protected in a democratic society only if its citizens have access to information and ideas through books and other sources of information'. It also says that libraries must protect the essential confidential relationship between a library user and the library. And it then sets out some principles as basic and distinctive of the obligations and responsibilities of the librarian. I want to quote from these at length, because they are important.
'The functions of the librarian include: to promote the use of materials in the librarian's care; to ensure that the resources of the library are adequate to its purpose; to obtain additional information from outside sources to meet the needs of readers; to cater for interest in all relevant facets of knowledge, literature and contemporary issues, including those of a controversial nature; but neither to promote or suppress particular ideas and beliefs.
A librarian, while recognising that powers of censorship exist and are legally vested in state and federal governments, should resist attempts by individuals or organised groups within the community to determine what library materials are to be, or are not to be, available to the users of the library.
A librarian should not exercise censorship in the selection of materials by rejecting on moral, political, racial or religious grounds alone material which is otherwise relevant to the purpose of the library and meets the standards, such as historical importance, intellectual integrity, effectiveness of expression or accuracy of information which are required by the library concerned. Material should not be rejected on the grounds that its content is controversial or likely to offend some sections of the library's community.
A librarian should uphold the right of all Australians to have access to library services and materials and should not discriminate against users on the grounds of age, sex, race, religion, national origin, disability, economic condition, individual lifestyle or political or social views.
A librarian must obey the laws relating to books and libraries, but if the laws or their administration conflict with the principles put forward in this statement, the librarian should be free to move for the amendment of these laws.'
The Statement on professional ethics embraces these same principles as appropriate.
There have been very few occasions in my career when freedom of access to information has been an issue I have had to take a stand on. I recall when a Minister for the Arts in New South Wales in the 1970s argued the State Library of New South Wales should not hold material debating the merits of smoking marijuana. I also recall a mild skirmish in the early 1980s in the State Library of Victoria with Bruce Ruxton who thought Stalin and Breznhev evil men, whose writings were better not held in the State Library of Victoria. But other colleagues, especially in public libraries, have been bloodied over the years in debates on defending these fundamental freedoms, and I suspect more will be in the near future over the content debate.
These Association statements as I have said come from the age of print as the main source of information. Print is still very much alive and well, but vast amounts of information are now becoming available through the internet.
I believe very strongly that these principles still underpin provision of library services to Australians in an electronic environment, and are of fundamental importance also to the maintenance of our democratic values. It saddens me that much of the debate about material on the internet seems to start from the perspective of control of internet content, rather than a recognition of the liberating and democratic nature of the internet and its wonderful capacity to provide information so dynamically.
The profession, and this Association, has of course been exploring these issues. The then Executive Director, Virginia Walsh, in a paper presented to the Institute of Public Administration Australia, National Conference in November 1997 remarked that:
'The basic democratic right of unfettered access to information is under challenge as new means of content regulation in the digital environment threaten to undermine existing rights to access information. And there are other emerging considerations which require thoughtful resolution. These include privacy issues, preservation of digital records, cost of infrastructure development and the protection of intellectual property and moral rights of authors. Can public policy solutions be developed which will deliver the promise of greater access to the global world of information?'
The Association has made very good submissions to all relevant enquiries of recent years, not just on behalf of the professions but also the interests of Australians who depend on access to information through libraries. The general thrust of the Association's position, which I strongly support, can be gauged by this extract from the submission to the Australian Broadcasting Authority's Online Services Investigation of February 1996:
'The Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA) favours the creation of an on-line code of practice and an on-line regulatory body which represents the interests of community, industry and government. The Association seeks to ensure that equity of access to information is not compromised in the new medium, while still being responsive to community concerns relating to the nature of the information which accessible on-line. ALIA believes that, in time, technological solutions can be found for technological problems. It is the content of on-line services, particularly in the context of community standards and the protection of intellectual property interests, which requires immediate consideration. Existing regulatory mechanisms which apply to the distribution of current media have application to on-line information and the development of new media should not alter our society's fundamental commitment to freedom of information and access to a broad range of materials. Where these regulatory mechanisms have limited applicability, such as in the case of content generated beyond our national boundaries, on-line service providers can not be held responsible for material accessed by users.'
The Association's Interim statement on use of online information in libraries of July 1998 also embraces the thrust of these comments.
The present hearings of the Senate Select Committee on Information Technologies on the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Online Services) Bill 1999, which I have already mentioned, encapsulate for me many of these issues. I encourage you to read the Hansard of these hearings, freely and democratically available through the internet, and the Association submission. [This free and timely availability of Hansard and other parliamentary material is a splendid demonstration of the power for good of the internet.] What interests me is not the debate over whether the proposals in the Bill for control of material are practicable, although I share the almost general doubt about this, but some of the matters being discussed. The fate of this Bill is of course, by coincidence being probably decided today in this Parliament.
While much of the debate has focused on control of pornography, there has also been an undercurrent flowing through the Committee's hearings about access to material on the internet which is freely available in print form in the majority of libraries right now. This includes for example material on bomb-making, drugs and shoplifting, examples often used of what is argued to be questionable material. The constant mention of bomb-making fascinates me, because I could find information easily on this in all state libraries and many large public libraries. The National Library of Australia also holds a wealth of material, indeed much material published by US Government agencies, relevant to bomb-making. There has also been questioning on whether material on the internet expresses what might be argued to be undesirable social values, or does not portray desirable stereotypes including of women. Again, libraries hold much material already which would certainly not meet the test of the questioners, quite apart from much of the stock of newsagents as mentioned in the Committee's hearings. It is disconcerting to see the word 'unsuitable' so often used in this debate, which is hardly a valid test.
It is inevitable, and in my view necessary if libraries are to fulfil their role in supporting democratic values, that they will hold material repugnant to some people in the community. The Association's Statement on freedom to read gets to the heart of this in the words 'Material should not be rejected ... which is likely to offend some sections of the Library's community'. This principle has to be part of the democratic principles also underlying access to material on the internet.
A very interesting article in Tuesday's Australian titled 'Industry's failure in realpolitick' made some pertinent remarks on other aspects of this debate. It reported the comment of Victor Perton, described as an internet-savvy state Liberal MP in Victoria, that technologists 'are so intent on entrancing people with a high-end vision' that they forget most social opinion leaders do not yet understand the net. He noted that most internet groups appearing in these hearings offered little assistance to MPs under pressure in countering the common impression that the internet represented a flood of pornography and violence.
My second comment on the hearings is that it is welcoming to read so much evidence recognising the general good sense of the community in understanding these issues, but especially parents' and children's maturity in understanding content issues. A splendid example is the evidence of Mr Charles Britton of the Australian Consumers Association, but answering as a parent, on pages 201-202 of the 3 May transcript. Satisfactory solutions to these complex issues require community tolerance and maturity, as in the previous print regime. I spent most of the first two decades of my career working closely with library users, including young people, and my overwhelming recollection is of their responsibility, balance and maturity. 'Trust the people' is certainly a slogan I believe in so far as public library service is concerned.
I want to comment on the evidence given by Jennefer Nicholson, acting executive director of the Association, again at the 3 May hearing. This can be found on pages 190-197 of the transcript. This evidence as you may know was part of the ABC's PM coverage of the hearings that evening. Jennefer in articulating the librarian's responsibilities for young people and internet content provision carefully and sensibly explained that this involves a partnership of the librarian, the young person and the responsible adult, and in the context of strong internet guidelines and policies. This seems to me the correct balance of responsibilities and reality. The library cannot, and should not, be expected to monitor internet access on any more restrictive basis, and I cannot see it as potentially giving open slather to pornography.
I want to turn now to the issues Sir Anthony Mason spoke about in the first Oration delivered in 1996. As I have said he spoke of his concerns about the possible impact of restriction on the free flow of knowledge, information and ideas as the copyright debate was played out. I shared those concerns at the time, and feel them more deeply now because of developments in recent months.
Sir Anthony's speech is an eloquent statement about issues fundamental to the free flow of knowledge, ideas and information in Australia, a matter he described as vital to the political, intellectual, economic and social life, as well as the education, of all Australians. He spoke during the major Copyright Law Review Committee review of the time, and expressed a profound sense of unease about the thrust of some of the then discussion documents. He argued they failed to give adequate prominence to the paramount Australian public interest in the free flow of knowledge, ideas and information. He spoke also of the need to acknowledge that the value of Australia's imports of copyright material far outweighs the value of its exports of such material. He said that extension of copyright protection would, in all probability, aggravate that marked imbalance.
A strong point he also made was there should be no weakening of the exception in favour of fair dealing. Sir Anthony said 'The 'fair dealing' exception to infringement of copyright is and always has been squarely-based recognition of the paramount interest in the copying or reproduction of copyright material for certain purposes such as research and study, criticism or review, news reporting, court proceedings and the provision of legal advice.'
The Government, after CLRC advice and other major consultations, some months ago released the exposure Digital Agenda Copyright Bill, and is expected to bring the Bill before the impending winter session of the Parliament. The Bill addresses the issue of copyright reform in a digital environment, and has been eagerly awaited by libraries and others because of the total inadequacy of the present copyright law in such an environment. It is fair comment to say that libraries, although not winning all they might have wanted, have been fairly pleased with the exposure draft and seen it as a reasonable attempt to balance the rights of copyright holders and public interest.
But it cannot in any sense be seen as a victory for libraries. The comments by Brendan Scott of the law firm Gilbert and Tobin on copyright on the 'net, in this month's inCite, are interesting in this context. He argues that extension of existing exceptions for libraries in reality means 'that libraries' ideals will trapped within book-base methods', and that since the internet is about ubiquity and ease of access 'By retaining the old exceptions without extension libraries of tomorrow will be shackled with yesterday's paradigms.' There is much sense in this comment.
No one wins all they want in such complicated areas of public policy. Librarians respect the principle of copyright, which they see as very importance. But they believe in some limits on monopoly protection, linked to broader objectives society wants to achieve, and they believe this even more vital in a digital environment.
But the reaction of the copyright owner interests, led by Copyright Agency Limited [CAL] and the publishing sector, has been truly astonishing. They have argued ferociously that the proposals are severely detrimental to all copyright owners. Essentially they want all uses of copyright material, no matter how small or how private, to be licensed. They demand that the long held rights of students, libraries and researchers are stripped away in a digital environment. They are, in simple terms, intransigent in their opposition to any national interest interests.
I am appalled at this campaign for several reasons, the first being that I think it comprehensively misstates the position of libraries in the new digital environment if the Bill is passed. The Bill simply allows libraries to utilise new technology in providing services to the same limited user group they have always existed to serve, rights they have exercised very responsibly. It does not increase the range of activities they can carry out under the Copyright Act. Libraries have had tightly regulated rights to copy limited amounts of copyright material for their users for a long time, and nothing in this Bill extends those long terms rights in a digital environment.
But I am also appalled, as an Australian interested in the civic good of this country, at what the effects upon education, cultural life, intellectual vigour and a whole range of specialised pursuits including science would be if this campaign were to be successful. And I am appalled that the debate seems to be going on virtually unknown outside specialised interests and unknown to most Australians, when it is their present rights that are threatened. And, it has to be said, I have in recent years become angered at the calumny and misrepresentations associated with this campaign.
The position of Copyright Agency Limited in this is very interesting. CAL's legislative basis is the Copyright Act 1968, which authorised its operations. It was incorporated in May 1974, but did not begin its operations until 1986. It has in my view moved a very long way past the intentions of the Parliament in Section 135P of that Act, establishing the principle of 'The Collecting Society'.
The opening statement on CAL's website is that 'CAL is a copyright management company which centrally manages the copyright interests of thousands of publishers and authors, including print journalists. Our aim is to promote awareness of and respect for copyright.'
Fine words indeed, and I only wish they were true. But CAL has little respect for the present laws of copyright, insofar as they embrace long cherished concepts such as fair dealing. By respect for copyright it means unilateral acceptance of its position, and it argues vehemently for major restriction upon other rights in the legislation.
Perhaps the most frustrating professional exercise I have ever been involved in was one initiated by CAL some years ago, when it invited interests including libraries, where I represented the National Library, to informal discussions to see if we could find any common ground on the copyright impasse. This became known as the Gilgandra Group, from a comment by another librarian that we must never forget there are people in Gilgandra with major information needs, and that surely that was the purpose of the discussions. They were intellectually absorbing, but achieved nothing, because everyone else was expected to compromise on positions but not CAL.
My purpose in making these comments in the last few minutes or so is not to abuse CAL. They are unlikely to be affected by anything I say, and as cheerfully on occasion denigrate what libraries argue for. But rather it relates to the purpose of this Oration, and why people asked me at short notice to change the topic I was to speak about. This copyright debate is of central importance to the Australian people and the quality of their lives. The decisions will be made in this place where I speak today. It is essential that parliamentarians be informed of public views on these weighty matters, and the diversity of opinion and passion. But with some exceptions, notably the efforts of the Australian Digital Alliance and the Australian Consumers Association, the public interest view on the copyright debate is just not being heard. And debate in the media is limited largely to specialist media. It is just not seen as a major public issue, yet the outcome will directly and deeply affect most Australians.
And the Australian library profession shares culpability in this. Librarians, by shared professional values and history, believe in a balanced copyright regime that takes account of the legitimate interests of copyright owners, and the balancing national interest. But their views are little heard by our legislators. Whatever else happens with this Oration, the Association will presumably post it on their website. I encourage the Association to also exhort the profession to just once, individually and all, become agitators and make their voice heard on this issue to their legislators now, and to encourage their user to be involved in the debate. Libraries are central to democratic access by Australians to the information they need for their lives, and a balanced copyright regime in the digital environment central to their continued effectiveness.
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