Bill C-11 Committee on March 6th, 2012

[Mario Chenart]

For each person who makes a fortune in this area, there will be 50 who will contribute to our diversity and earn a small amount. These are the people we are thinking of. Clearly I don't think Justin Bieber needs piecemeal calculations, but there are a lot of people who are not stars.

I am thinking of songwriters and composers; I represent people who are not singers, who are not musicians, and who do not collect studio fees. They write a song that is sung by someone who may or may not become a star. That person's living will be dependent on the number of times the song is played on the radio, on television, or sold as a file or a disk. Songwriters earn 9 ¢ a song. That is what they earn.

If Céline Dion sings on the Plains of Abraham and is paid a talent fee of a few hundred thousand dollars, as a songwriter, I will earn a percentage of the rights the song she sings will generate. If the show is broadcast on television, I will earn something, and if she makes a disk, I will earn something there too. That is how I will earn this money; I will not get any part of the money for an advertisement Céline Dion makes for Chrysler, nor a portion of her fee for a show in Las Vegas. I will get a copyright fee for the concert, for the reproductions, etc. That is all I will get.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

When the Conservatives introduced these measures aimed at virtually abolishing mechanical rights, they said their purpose was to protect the small broadcasters. A broadcaster may pay $820 a year for mechanical reproduction rights; that does not seem like an abusive sum to me to contribute to the support of Canadian and Quebec artists.

[Mario Chenart]

If you multiply that by the number of songs a songwriter writes in a year, you will see that we have not made anyone very rich. The quotas are very respectful of the size of the radio stations. All of the community radio stations pay a symbolic tariff, but it is different for the other stations, those that generate profits.

I was listening to the testimony of the radio station representatives and their famous argument. I thought of my brother-in-law who made support payments for a large part of his life...

[The Chair, NDP, Glenn Thibeault]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chenart.

Now we'll go to Mr. Calandra for five minutes.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Shepherd, I want to try to understand this a little better. When the radio stations came, when some of the broadcasters came, they said they download music from a system. I'm assuming you're familiar with the system. That's how they access the music.

To your knowledge, can this system be modified so that you can't download and use songs for 34 days, 33 days, 32 days?

[Victoria Shepherd]

That's a technical question that I don't have the answer to, I'm sorry.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Could you find that out for us and get back to us?

[Victoria Shepherd]

Absolutely.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

The point being if a radio station doesn't have the ability to download for 33 days and somehow the industry can place that, then it would seem that the fear of erasing and recopying would be somewhat in the control of the person who's making the download available and not necessarily the broadcasters themselves, if they did it.

So if you could get back to me on that, I'd appreciate that.

[Victoria Shepherd]

Absolutely.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Mr. Chenart, you were here, I think, last week—

[Mario Chenart]

Yes.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

—with another group. I don't have their name handy, but if I recall correctly, they represented 100,000 Quebec songwriters.

[Mario Chenart]

The rights holders.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Let me ask you this. If I'm writing a song for any artist, do I get paid to write the song?

[Mario Chenart]

No, you are not paid for writing it. You will only see an income if your work is used. Some publishers will pay an advance to a songwriter, if there is a publisher in the business plan. The publisher may pay an advance on royalties that may be collected if the song is a money-maker. We only get a percentage of what the song generates.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Can I write a song and sell it to an artist? Am I forbidden from doing that?

[Mario Chenart]

It is not a common practice. I am not saying it is impossible, but it is not the norm.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Okay.

[Mario Chenart]

There is another indirect answer to your question: there are some very well-known artists who will say that if their name goes on an album, they may help increase the sale of disks, and so they ask for an advance for every 100,000 disks sold, for instance. That is an advance. Someone who takes a financial risk by deciding to pay for a song written by Luc Plamondon or Gordon Lightfoot, for instance, may ask for an advance for a larger number of sold copies.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

In your submission you also talk about making Internet service providers have far greater responsibility...how does that differ? How do you police...? Today you're talking about representing 800 people. When you were here the other day it was 100,000.

[Mario Chenart]

The SPACQ has 800 members, who are for the most part francophone songwriters and composers who write for films and television. In English Canada, there is the Songwriters Association of Canada and the Screen Composers Guild of Canada.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

How does your organization police the people it represents to make sure they're not doing something illegal and bringing disrespect to your organization?

You don't, right? Presumably you don't. They're members of your society.

[Mario Chenart]

No, but we do not use their repertory for commercial purposes, however.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

So why would the Internet service providers be any different? I think when you were here last time I gave the example of a builder who builds a home and someone puts a grow op in it. Is Hydro-Québec responsible because they put the hydro in the home? Is the homebuilder responsible because he built a home that could be turned into a grow op?

Again, is it not the same type of argument?