Industry Committee on May 7th, 2018

[Terrilee Bulger]

Around there, yes.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

As a final number, Mr. Campbell, you said two things. First, you are paying $200,000 per year right now in licensing. Is that correct?

[Dr. H.E.A. (Eddy) Campbell]

No. It's the cost of our copyright activities.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Is that $200,000 per year?

[Dr. H.E.A. (Eddy) Campbell]

Yes. This includes, for example, the salary of our copyright officer—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

You already said that. How much of that is Canadian? How much goes to Canadian producers, out of that $200,000?

[Dr. H.E.A. (Eddy) Campbell]

I do not know.

Lesley, can you help with that?

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

You don't have to have it right now, but I'd like to know that number.

[Lesley Balcom]

That's a figure we could submit, but just to be clear, it doesn't refer exclusively to licensing costs. It includes salary costs as well.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

In that case, I'd just like to know the licensing cost, not the person doing the licensing. I understand that.

Just how much is going out the door, and how much is specifically going to Canadian content.

[Lesley Balcom]

It's very hard for academic libraries to determine what's Canadian content—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Do your best.

[Lesley Balcom]

—because what we're well aware of is that a lot of Canadian authors aren't writing in Canadian publications. I just want to be clear on the question.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Why don't we do this then. Tell me how much is going to Canadian publishers because that's what you're representing. Is that right, Ms. Bulger?

[Terrilee Bulger]

Yes.

[Dr. H.E.A. (Eddy) Campbell]

The millions of dollars that we do spend across the country on electronic resources from the largest publishers in the world—Springer Publishing, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., and the like—are full of academics who are writing for other academics to read. Those are typically the uses of those materials, and they're virtually all in electronic form. Part of the reason we see such an intense increase in library costs to universities over time has been this consolidation of publishers—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Yes, the five big publishers.

[Dr. H.E.A. (Eddy) Campbell]

—and it gives them a certain power to—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I get that. I'm looking very specifically to understand the financial impact for Canadian content providers and trying to distill it down to this one group, so if you could work that—

Sorry, go ahead, Ms. Workman.

[Teresa Workman]

Another number I have is from Statistics Canada. It says that the data shows that Canadian publishing was largely unaffected by fair dealing, given the other changes taking place in the market. In fact, Canadian publisher operating profit margin has increased since the copyright reform—

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I was a businessman before becoming a politician, so I could have amazing profit margins on $100 of sales, but I'd rather have not such great margins on $100 million.

[Teresa Workman]

Fair enough.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I've heard that statistic.

I'm going to run out of time this round, but I do understand that all three of the universities have expressed a desire to help the Canadian publishing groups.

You said that you're buying New Brunswick books. Is that correct, Mr. Campbell?

[Dr. H.E.A. (Eddy) Campbell]

Yes, certainly.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

And Ms. Bourne, you said you're buying two books from every.... Did I get that right?