1.7 Factsheet- Crown Copyright and the Open Government Licence

1.7 Factsheet: Crown Copyright and the Open Government
Licence
1. Crown Copyright
“Crown copyright covers material created by civil servants, ministers and government
departments and agencies.
It is legally defined under section 163 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 as
works made by officers or servants of the Crown in the course of their duties.
Copyright can also come into Crown ownership by means of assignment or transfer of the
copyright from the legal owner of the copyright to the Crown.” 1
2. Crown Copyright and NHS Scotland
The situation regarding ownership of materials created by the Scottish Government
and its agencies is complex, and such materials may not always be available under
the Open Government Licence (see below). You are advised to consult with your
local library contact for advice if you wish to copy such materials. If necessary, you
may have to request permission from the copyright owner, even if it is another
Scottish Health Board. It is, however, reasonable to assume that you are entitled to
copy and re-use anything created by your own Health Board.
3. The Open Government Licence
As part of its UK Government Licensing Framework 2 , the National Archives recently
launched the Open Government Licence (OGL) 3 , facilitating the reuse of Government
and other public sector information and also its Non Commercial Government
Licence 4 . The OGL replaces the “Click Use” licence previously used to provide
access to Crown Copyright materials. As with Creative Commons licences, it is
available in a machine readable form as well as a “human-readable” form. Unlike
Creative Commons licences, it defaults to the governing legislation to which the
licensor (i.e., the Government Department or Agency) has their place of business. It
does not permit copying of logos, registered trademarks and other IP such as patents,
and includes specific non-endorsement clauses.
1 For more information about Crown Copyright see: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/information-­management/our-­‐services/crown-­‐copyright.htm
2 http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/information-­‐management/uk-­‐gov-­‐licensing-­‐framework.htm
3 http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-­‐government-­‐licence/
4 http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/non-­‐commercial-­‐government-­‐licence/
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15 April 2013
© NHSS, 2013. This paper is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs Licence.
Version 1.0
The contents of this paper are for information purposes and guidance only. They do not constitute legal advice

4. Key points about the OGL
• The OGL is compatible with the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY) for
content, and also the Open Data Commons Attribution Licence for data, datasets and
databases. For more information about Creative Commons, see 2.5 FAQ: Overview
of Creative Commons.
• It covers a broad range of Information (classed as works in copyright, data,
databases and source code, etc.) and so provides the means for data, databases,
content, etc., to be licensed under one licence – which is useful for content
comprising of multiple elements.
• The OGL provides the mechanism for public sector content to be made accessible
under the same terms with minimal restrictions on the user – thus providing the
mechanism by which public sector information can reused, adapted, blended
together, etc.
• The OGL includes non-endorsement clauses, which are not present in the CC version
2.0 licences, although they are included in the CC version 3.0 licences.
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15 April 2013
© NHSS, 2013. This paper is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs Licence.
Version 1.0
The contents of this paper are for information purposes and guidance only. They do not constitute legal advice