Good morning.
My name is Jean-Robert Bisaillon and I am an elected member of the board of directors of the Songwriters Association of Canada. I am co-vice-president together with Greg Johnston.
I too would like to thank the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage for allowing me to speak as part of its consultations on the Canadian music industry.
To begin with, I will cite one of our joint objectives.
“Ultimately, the Canadian Sound Recording Policy will...adopt a more holistic approach to developing this sector.”
For the SAC, this holistic approach is based on the fundamental fact that all links in the industry chain that produces great Canadian music must be valued equally.
We feel that current support measures for singer-songwriters and the royalties we receive from online music providers will ultimately be inadequate to enable us to stay in business. Consequently, for us, a holistic approach means establishing a sustainable industry that can regenerate itself.
New technologies are fabulous. I myself am involved in the software sector. However, they also have very disruptive effects. Our sector has suffered a 40% loss in value since physical music media disappeared. This has disrupted the experience of Canadian consumers without any satisfactory new models being introduced. We are dealing with permanent downloading from iTunes and file-sharing on BitTorrent networks using USB keys and cloud storage. There is also interactive and semi-interactive digital radio and online mobile listening. We are even seeing a return to vinyl. We believe that consumers are completely lost in all this.
One of the objectives of the music industry consultation exercise is to find ways, and I quote:
“To enhance Canadians' access to a diverse range of Canadian music choices through existing and emerging media”.
Our music industry, like consumers, does not have access to Canadian music platforms or digital apps created by Canadian tech start-ups. No one has access to satisfactory new distribution or consumer models.
The Songwriters Association of Canada is constantly looking for ways to study and document this situation. Out of our own resources, we funded a study on Canadian peer-to-peer music-sharing practices, that is to say file-sharing. We are currently conducting a study on fair compensation for creators in accordance with effective royalty rates based on digital use. The following statements are taken from that study.
The songwriting model is no longer sustainable. Despite our role as the primary content provider, our revenue share is largely insufficient relative to those of other industries. In streaming radio, our share of costs incurred by the platforms is less than 1%.
As Greg mentioned, we are saying that digital streaming radio industry revenues should increase. Most subscriptions to those services are currently free of charge and generate royalty levels that are tantamount to piracy. Even an increase in paid subscriptions for these services would not help us. Music creators must invariably receive a larger share of the revenue stream.
Several income sources are currently excluded from the calculation of royalties. Please note that contractual advances paid by some labels from certain music platforms are excluded from the calculation, as are revenues from the sale and mining of user data, some ad revenues and gains generated by the issuance of public shares by certain players.
I'm almost done.
In order to obtain equal remuneration, we must be able to put transparent reporting processes in place. We believe that music industry businesses could gain a competitive advantage in this area by meeting new transparency requirements.
We would like to test these Canadian music service certification models in cooperation with representatives of the entire industry chain, including content aggregators, high tech start-ups and telecommunications businesses. Songwriters must be able to conduct independent studies and compliance tests specific to their needs.
Lastly, these efforts will help restore consumer confidence in legal online offerings and in the Canadian industry in general.
A holistic frame of reference means, above all, a sustainable music industry ecosystem.
Thank you very much.