The British Library has thrown out up to 80,000 books in a change of policy which has brought to an end its 338-year- old role of collecting every volume published in Britain.
The library, which under copyright law receives every new book, cleared well over a mile of shelves. The books were chosen and weeded by "comparatively junior grade professional staff" to make room for new stock.
The new policy, though approved by the library board, has not been publicly announced.
Yesterday a library spokesman at first denied that it had been introduced. Later he confirmed it after hearing that a senior staff member had acknowledged its existence in a letter to a scholar. The letter indicated that it had been suspended because of lack of staff to do more weeding. But no assurances could be given that it would not be resumed.
The move, which breaks a practice that began in 1662 and made the British Library a near complete historical collection, came to light during inquiries by Keith Armstrong, an author researching a book on the history of disability.
Mr Armstrong, who has written or edited four other books, discovered that five books he wanted to read were marked "discarded" in the library catalogue.
He also found a copy of an important work in his field, by the psychologist Deborah Marks, in a London secondhand bookshop. Though published only last year, it was marked "British Library - withdrawn".
His protest to the library led to a reply which horrified him, he said yesterday. Richard Cheffins, head of the BL's social policy information service, told him discarding began after the board accepted a 1989 report, headed Selection for Survival, by Brian Enright, librarian of Newcastle University.
Dr Enright's report said the steeply rising number of books published meant that the time-honoured policy of storing each one would put an ever-increasing cash burden on the BL and imperil the quality of its collections.
Mr Cheffins explained that discarding of low use books began soon after the report was accepted.
"Decisions on a case-by-case basis were made by comparatively junior grade professional staff.
"I am given to understand that, over a couple of years, some 2km of stock in all - about 70,000-80,000 volumes - were withdrawn", he told Mr Armstrong.
"The space thus freed was filled within a few months with the growth of new stock... You are obviously disturbed that any material, once part of our collections, should have been discarded.
"There is not much that can be done about that".
Mr Cheffins added that "a significant number of about 25 library users a year asked for discarded titles. None of the titles would have been available elsewhere in the country". Last night a BL spokesman said: "The discarding of books is an ongoing process."
