We have no problem getting high-quality staff, but in persuading postgraduate students that it is sensible to research here given the quality of library resources in London or America. York is already talking to owners of private collections - in stately homes, for instance. But a recent furore over Keele University's sale of Isaac Newton books donated by a benefactor has made owners nervous about giving collections to universities. Heaps is adamant that York would not sell off books. Universities are of course eager to promote their own collections, but Milne has found that the promise from his programme set up after the 1996 Anderson Report of funding is inducing them to collaborate , even if with gritted teeth to start with.
Money is a great attraction.
More difficult has been the lack of joined up interdepartmental thought and funding. Universities get money from the higher education funding councils, public libraries from several different departments. It makes collaboration complicated and bureaucratic, though it is happening. The British Library and the School of Oriental and African Studies, for instance, have agreed which Chinese resources each should collect. The Queen's University of Belfast has scooped a couple of particularly neat acronyms.