Industry Committee on May 8th, 2018

[Benoit Prieur]

Essentially, the discussion we are having is about the balance between rights holders and users. We are trying to figure out how to strike a balance between those two groups' rights.

I think that everyone is virtuous. Academics and students, like everyone, want copyright to be respected. Industry people also want openness and innovation. We mustn't forget that creators are also innovators. They are risk takers. The quest for balance between the rights of users and those of creators is ongoing.

What divides us, when we think of an organization like Copibec, are essentially money issues. It was mentioned earlier that the fees were $13.50 per student. That is what gives students access to reproduced works today. Of course, everyone has their opinion on that amount. However, when it comes to everything else, those are not significant amounts or amounts that may discourage someone from studying. Maybe some are discouraged by having to pay $13.50, but that is still a relatively small amount. That is what we are discussing today. Those are relatively small amounts that could be increased without anyone in the education system being distressed.

[Mary Ng, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Sapp?

[Nicolas Sapp]

You are talking about technological solutions or possibilities, but the problem is that our current world is going through technological upheavals. In education, universities are important structures. People forget this, but the iPhone is 10 years old and the iPad is six or seven years old. The iPad, if only in Montreal, put an end to print media.

Of course, collectives that are struggling with those technological upheavals are trying to adapt, as are universities, which are doing their best and are somewhere between the two words. I am sure that, if there were any miraculous platforms, we would adopt them. However, the challenge remains given the fast pace of those changes, the amount of debate on Facebook and the money extracted from that platform, as well as other issues that produces.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Lloyd, you have five minutes.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

Mr. Chair, my remarks and questions will be in English. My first question is for Monsieur Prieur.

You noted that 10% can be used in very clever ways. Do you have a recommendation for a better way to measure how many pages or what percentage could be used in a way that would better achieve a balance between authors and users?

[Richard Prieur]

The 10% I was talking about is related to standard practice. Mr. Sapp said earlier that the majority of Quebec universities had an agreement with Copibec, but that Université Laval did not. That university is currently facing a class action suit initiated by authors, publishers and rights holders. Université Laval did not negotiate an agreement and is arguing that fair dealing translates to 10% of a work—one chapter, one poem from a poetry collection or, possibly, one article from a magazine or a newspaper.

That's all fine and well, but what about a book with three chapters?

What about a collection of poetry with five poems?

Those interpretations strain the definition of fair dealing and the percentage of use, especially when it comes to universities.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

Do you have a recommendation? What would be a better measurement system?

[Richard Prieur]

Yes, the recommendation is that universities should negotiate agreements with collectives like Copibec. That way, it would at least feel like there is an agreement between the two parties. That is the least that can be done. Quebec universities are doing it, with the exception of Université Laval. I don't want to talk about what is happening on the English side, but I think the situation in Quebec is significantly more dramatic in that respect.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

My second question is for Concordia.

Mr. Sapp, you noted that acquisition costs are up. What does this mean? Does this mean the cost of textbooks for resale to students, or is it of works being held in libraries or for personal faculty purposes?

[Nicolas Sapp]

Significant costs are related to digital content. Certain figures speak for themselves. As the chief librarian mentioned earlier, the cost of digital content has increased significantly at Concordia University.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

How are these being used? Are they being used for students? Are these digital and print resources being sold to students, or are they just being stored in libraries for people to use freely?

[Nicolas Sapp]

The best person to answer this question is Ms. Beaudry.

[Guylaine Beaudry]

Those increases are for acquisition of multimedia and digital material. As I mentioned, out of our budget, 90% goes to the acquisition of digital resources.

These are resources for all of our community members, for the entire university community, as is the case for all the other universities in the country, actually. They are for research activities, for learning activities, for teaching activities. Those increases are not really for textbooks. Textbooks usually are paid for by students.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

That leads me to my next question. From your statistics, has the cost of learning materials such as textbooks decreased since fair dealing was put into effect in 2012?

[Guylaine Beaudry]

It is quite the contrary, actually. At Concordia we decided, like a few other universities, to buy textbook materials, which was not necessarily the case before, in order to lower the barriers to knowledge and education.

According to the number of students we have per course, we're buying a certain number of textbooks to put on reserve.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

You're buying these textbooks? Are these textbooks then being sold, correspondingly?

[Guylaine Beaudry]

They are also sold, yes.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

But is there an inventory? Do you have a lot of excess inventory of textbooks, or are you finding that you're efficiently purchasing enough textbooks and they're being sold correspondingly at about an equilibrium rate?

[Guylaine Beaudry]

It's not necessarily that way. The bookstore is selling textbooks to students, and we have a few copies at the library.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

What I'm asking is this. Let's say you buy 100 textbooks for your bookstore. Are 100 textbooks then being sold, or are 90 textbooks being sold? How many are then being sold to the students?

[Guylaine Beaudry]

How many are not sold to the students?

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

How many are and how many aren't?

[Guylaine Beaudry]

I can't really answer that question. I don't know.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

It seems to me that you could buy 100 textbooks, but if the students aren't actually purchasing them, then that's a significant.... If the students aren't buying them, it can't be counted as a cost for their textbooks.

[Guylaine Beaudry]

My impression is that the inventory matches the requests.

I just want to make one point here. The scientific publishing market is really at the international level. Ninety-two per cent of our collections are non-literary materials. We love our friends, our publishers in Quebec and Canada, but most of what we're buying is not coming from those publishers.

You don't have vases communicants. It's not as though, if we increase our budget, it will have an impact on our literary authors, and even other kinds of publishing activities, authors in Canada—because of the nature of our activities, which is research.