Tuesday 25 May 2010
at St George’s, University of London


Present: Bethan Adams, Ann Murphy (Chair), Gurdish Sandhu, Christine Wise (Secretary), April Yasamee

By invitation: Jeremy Shillito, The British Library

Apologies: Tim Cullen, Bill Downey, John Gilby, Dilys Hall

1. Welcomes

AM welcomed colleagues to the meeting, especially Jeremy Shillito of The British Library.

2. Minutes of the meeting held 16 February 2010 and matters arising

These were confirmed as an accurate record, with matters arising dealt with under the agenda items below.

3. Report back from M25 Consortium Steering Group Meeting

AM reported back on the M25 Steering Group meeting held on 15 March 2010.  Discussion points had included:

• Endorsement of the draft M25 Strategic Plan 2010/11-2012/13
• Planning for the M25 conference to be held on 23 April 2010
• Continuing use of the online M25 Directors’ Room and development of the M25 Staff Room
• Consortium finances, including a predicted slight overspend
• Review of InforM25, by the Digital Developments Working Group
• Promotion of awareness of M25 services, to be further discussed at the next Steering Group meeting
• The M25 Marketing and Communications Strategy, which AM would circulate to Working Group members
  

ACTION AM

4. Current issues of interest to M25 Consortium members not funded by HEFCE

AY reported that she had joined the London Museums Libraries and Archives Group (LMLAG) (http://lmlag.wordpress.com/), and had established further information about the consortial purchasing arrangement with NESLI and with JISC for access to certain e-resource bundles.  She noted that some museum libraries provided “walk-in” access for e-resources, which she would investigate further.  GS described a US service which enabled subscribers to have access to licensed e-resources regardless of their physical location, and would circulate details.
ACTION GS
AY was currently researching different models whereby smaller libraries might affiliate with larger institutions.  Contacts with the Historic Libraries Forum (http://www.historiclibrariesforum.org.uk/), the Cathedral Libraries and Archives Association (http://www.cofe.anglican.org/about/librariesandarchives/cathanddioceslibs/claabasicdetails.html) and the JISC Business and Community Engagement programme (http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/bce.aspx) were mentioned.

5. Inspire London: update and launch

AM reported that she had been co-opted onto the national Inspire Board, and that the Inspire London Working Group had decided to have a soft launch for Inspire London.  The Collections Trust (http://www.collectionstrust.org.uk/) has recently taken over responsibility for the national Inspire website (http://www.inspire2.org.uk/) and it was hoped shortly to migrate and to update data from the existing Inspire London website.
AM would contact M25 Consortium Directors in due course to advise them of the soft launch and to provide a reminder about participation arrangements.  Thereafter, training for front-line staff would be arranged regarding the practical access arrangements.

6. British Library Reading Rooms Working Group

AM invited Jeremy Shillito to brief Working Group members on the work of the British Library Reading Rooms Working Group.
He reported that this Working Group had been set up about two years before, prompted by growing demand in use of the British Library reading rooms.  In the first instance, the British Library’s response had been to increase seating capacity, and to revise publicity in order to manage demand.  The British Library was now entering a second phase, whereby it was seeking to work with Higher Education partners to research students’ use and collection consultation patterns at The British Library.  A working group including Directors of libraries in the vicinity of The British Library had been set up and had met several times.  In order to progress this work, it had been suggested that the M25 Consortium offered an existing consultation and discussion mechanism in particular through this Working Group.  An invitation was therefore extended to Jeremy Shillito to join this Working Group, which he would respond to in due course having consulted with members of the Working Group.

7. Update on UK library consortia

AM advised that she would be discussing arrangements for a meeting of UK consortia representatives with the M25 Support Team.
ACTION AM
GS noted the White Rose University Consortium (http://www.whiterose.ac.uk/), which was additional to the list of academic library consortia which had been prepared in February 2010.

8. London health libraries: M25 Consortium engagement and current developments

BH reported back on a recent meeting of the London Health Libraries Council, at which the new London Health Libraries Strategy had been reviewed.  She reported that the Library Charter for students using NHS libraries was also being revised.

9. Review of Working Group’s web pages on M25 Consortium website – http://www.m25lib.ac.uk/collaboration and partnership working group/index.php

AM would raise matters of content and updates at the next Steering Group meeting and this item would be discussed again at the Working Group meeting.
ACTION CW for agenda

10. Updates for the M25 Consortium Action Plan

The new M25 Strategic Plan 2009-2014 was noted and updates for the Action Plan would be provided in due course.

11. A.O.B.

There were no further items to report.

12. Date of next meeting

The next meeting would be held in late July 2010 at the University of Greenwich.  CW would canvass colleagues for convenient dates.
ACTION CW