On 16 July 2012, three major announcements transformed open access policy in the United Kingdom. The Research Councils UK RCUK announced a stronger version of the open access policy it originally adopted in 2006.1 2 The UK minister of universities and science announced that the government had accepted most of the recent open access recommendations from the Working Group on Expanding Access to Published Research Findings that he appointed last September informally called the Finch group after its convener, Janet Finch.3 4 5 Finally, the Higher Education Funding Council for England HEFCE announced plans to require open access to research submitted to the next Research Excellence Framework in 2014.6

via Ensuring open access for publicly funded research | BMJ.