More from the Canadian Harper government’s War on Libraries (see also: literally burning the environmental archives). Dave writes, “Health Canada scientists are also facing difficulties with government controlled libraries. It takes an insanely long time for them to receive any materials due to third-party delivery companies; they’ve started opening up their own unsanctioned libraries and have started taking advantage of external sources (industry and universities). This is turning into an insane story. There’s obviously demand for the material within government circles, but policy and cuts are making it impossible to access, resulting in statistics of diminished use, which results in more cuts.”
Health Canada used to have 40 librarians. Now it has six.
Before the main library closed, the inter-library loan functions were outsourced to a private company called Infotrieve, the consultant wrote in a report ordered by the department. The library’s physical collection was moved to the National Science Library on the Ottawa campus of the National Research Council last year.
“Staff requests have dropped 90 per cent over in-house service levels prior to the outsource. This statistic has been heralded as a cost savings by senior HC [Health Canada] management,” the report said.
“However, HC scientists have repeatedly said during the interview process that the decrease is because the information has become inaccessible — either it cannot arrive in due time, or it is unaffordable due to the fee structure in place.”
A recently retired Health Canada pathologist agreed with this assessment.
“I look at it as an insidious plan to discourage people from using libraries,” said Dr. Rudi Mueller, who left the department in 2012.
“If you want to justify closing a library, you make access difficult and then you say it is hardly used.”
Health Canada library changes leave scientists scrambling
[Laura Payton and Max Paris/CBC News
(Thanks, Dave!)