Evidence of meeting #112 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was publishers.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
You talked about course packs. We've been talking to a lot of universities. Ms. Andrew, can you give me an idea of how much you're spending on purchasing content?
Director and General Counsel, Office of Fair Practices and Legal Affairs, University of Manitoba
Do you mean purchasing content in general, or acquisitions?
Director and General Counsel, Office of Fair Practices and Legal Affairs, University of Manitoba
Yes, we have quite a bit of data on our acquisitions.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Could you break it down into how much it is for digital and non-digital? That would be greatly appreciated.
Director and General Counsel, Office of Fair Practices and Legal Affairs, University of Manitoba
I'll let the library answer on our acquisitions broken down into digital and electronic.
Liberal
Mary-Jo Romaniuk University Librarian, University of Manitoba
I can answer on behalf of what the library spent on purchasing, both electronic and print, in total, and I can give you the different amounts that we have spent in total over the years.
In 2012-13, we spent $9.485 million on acquisitions. That would include all acquisitions, including literary works in both e-format and print format. It would include the electronic subscriptions to journals and print journals.
In 2017-18, we spent $10.8 million on the same packages of things.
Liberal
University Librarian, University of Manitoba
We have. Some of that is because of inflationary pressures.
Liberal
University Librarian, University of Manitoba
Sure. In terms of electronic subscriptions, approximately half of it is electronic subscriptions, and that would be mostly for journals. Roughly 25% is for print subscriptions, those again likely being journals and book purchases, monograph purchases, which for us are literary works and scholarly works, as we tend not to purchase textbooks. This is $1.8 million. That would be combined between print and e-book. I could break that down further for you, because we have it in our submission. You can see there are a lot of numbers there.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Dan Ruimy
Everybody is taking advantage of my time right now. Thank you very much.
Before I move on, Ms. Greenberg, you had listed a book. Can you just tell us the name of the book and the author, please?
Editorial Director, Portage and Main Press, Association of Manitoba Book Publishers
There are a couple.
Liberal
Editorial Director, Portage and Main Press, Association of Manitoba Book Publishers
It's Indigenous Writes: A Guide to First Nations, Métis & Inuit Issues in Canada. It's written by Chelsea Vowel, who is, I guess, a lawyer and scholar. It's an interesting one because, both at the secondary and university level—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Dan Ruimy
That's fine. I just needed to know the name and the author. Thank you very much.
We're going to move to Mr. Lloyd. You have seven minutes.
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to you all for coming out today, and for your presentations.
My first question is going to be for Ms. Greenberg. You seem to be on the hot seat quite a bit today.
In our previous committee sessions, it's been noted by a lot of universities and schools that they have been shifting to digital, and this has been put forth as a reason that they're not going with traditional Access Copyright or other measures. You said earlier today that you publish e-books, so in your opinion, has the e-book market been drastically undercut by the current fair use provisions?
Editorial Director, Portage and Main Press, Association of Manitoba Book Publishers
I don't know. We sell e-books. We have not seen sales to universities. We haven't seen a lot of sales altogether.
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
So you've seen a drop in print sales, but you haven't seen a corresponding rise in digital sales.
Editorial Director, Portage and Main Press, Association of Manitoba Book Publishers
Not at all, no.
Conservative
Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB
Do you think, in your opinion, that you can infringe the copyright of an e-book?
Editorial Director, Portage and Main Press, Association of Manitoba Book Publishers
Absolutely.
Conservative