GovWire

The Public Lending Right (PLR) is a right for authors and other rights holders to receive payments from a central fund for the public lending of their books by libraries in the UK. The 2023 to 2024 PLR scheme year applies to the lending of physical books and audiobooks and the remote lending of e-books and e-audiobooks from public libraries.

Each year the British Library Board (which is responsible for administering the scheme) makes a recommendation to the Secretary of State of the rate per loan to be paid from the PLR fund to registered authors, illustrators and other contributors. The rate per loan is calculated on the basis of the size of the fund available and an estimate by the British Library of the total number of loans of their registered works, obtained from a sample of public libraries in the UK.

The British Library Board has proposed a rate per loan of 11.76 pence for payments in the 2023 to 2024 scheme year. This is a reduction of 1.93 pence, from 13.69 pence (in 2022/23). This reflects the slightly raised amount of funding available (but the PLR fund remains relatively unchanged), and an increase in the estimated number of loans of books registered for PLR.

This consultation invites views from authors and other interested parties on the proposed rate per loan for the 2023 to 2024 PLR scheme year.