Evidence of meeting #120 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 songwriters.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5 p.m.
Secretary-Treasurer, Guilde des musiciens et musiciennes du Québec
That's still millions of tracks listened to or downloaded that include illegal content.
5 p.m.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
I must admit that, as a mother of young adults, I check if they have downloaded illegal content. You know, it's such a part of their world that it seems they're not worried about it.
I also read that the royalties paid by streaming services—you may have brought this up earlier—amount to 10.2 cents per thousand plays for performers and producers. That's not much.
5 p.m.
Secretary-Treasurer, Guilde des musiciens et musiciennes du Québec
I don't know the exact amount, but what you're saying is very plausible.
5 p.m.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
It's from La Presse.
It's really very little. I am trying to understand how our study of the Copyright Act will provide the government with the means to intervene in this situation, given that the recording industry is significantly less than it once was.
I have been listening to you from the outset, and, if I understand correctly, the music world is really facing a new reality.
5 p.m.
Secretary-Treasurer, Guilde des musiciens et musiciennes du Québec
Ms. McGuffin mentioned a little earlier that the Copyright Board of Canada is currently holding hearings on online music tariffs, precisely in order to determine the value of the rights on performers' work, and, especially, the amounts that writers and producers will be able to receive from music streaming. From what I gathered, these amounts are currently far too low.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
5:05 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
For our part, we have felt over the last few years that if we had a Copyright Board with the correct processes that was delivering decisions in a timely manner for the music publishers' and the songwriters' side of this, that would make a big difference, because things such as minima and how to properly structure a tariff shouldn't be put into the act but should be put in front of a panel, with a Copyright Board that's functioning properly.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
Okay.
If I understand correctly, we have a role to play with the mandate and the role of the board, but, as I told you, it is a world I'm less familiar with.
For the benefit of our committee, can you please explain a bit how all of this works? I'm having a hard time understanding the role of the federal government, especially when you say that we won't be able to change the situation by simply amending the legislation.
5:05 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
The mandate of the board is presented in the Copyright Act.
5:05 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
There was a process last September through which 60 different people who go in front of the Copyright Board came up with different ways of making the Copyright Board more efficient. We put in a submission there, and a number of people you are going to hear from in the next few weeks did as well.
We talked about such things as giving timelines for the board to render their decisions, providing them with case management tools, etc. Some of these are things that will be done by the board itself, and out of that process you're going to get recommendations from each of us on things should be changed in the Copyright Act respecting the mandate of the board.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'll start with Ms. McGuffin.
You mentioned in your testimony that you support the extension of copyright for music work from life plus 50 to life plus 70 years. Can you explain to me how that extension would help the musicians and the singers today?
5:05 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
I'd be pleased to talk about that. Just to be very clear, we're talking about songwriters and not musicians when we talk about that term extension.
My members invest in emerging songwriters. They find them, they provide them with studio space, and they provide them with the ability to travel and co-write with songwriters around the world. A songwriter who chooses to go into a publishing deal is then entering into a relationship with an individual or a company that's helping to further their career.
Our companies can't make those decisions about such investments unless they have a strong revenue stream. As I explained, of our mid-sized companies, the strongest one is going to be the one that owns and administers foreign catalogues and Canadian catalogues and that has older works that are tried and true and that you can basically go to the bank with because you can predict the revenue flow for the next 10 years. Knowing what your revenue flow is going to be for the next 10 years can attract investors. This then allows you to sign that individual songwriter from Stratford, Ontario, and invest in their career.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
What you're saying is that the longer-term stream of revenue will give you security and will allow you to take risks to support not the musicians but the songwriters. Otherwise, not having that stream doesn't give you that security, and therefore, your risk tolerance for helping the smaller songwriters is lower.
5:05 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
Canadians companies have 20 years less. They may have a heavy investment in their portfolio of Canadian songwriters, so they have a shorter term to recoup their investments. Older songs, like those of Cole Porter, that have gone into the public domain, are still valuable.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
I know. I listen to 97.3 FM all the time. That's the music from my era.
How would this extension by 20 years help our industry abroad?
5:10 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
It allows us to continue what we've been doing for the last 12 years: investing in songwriters and taking those songwriters around the world.
My chairman, who is a songwriter, never appears on stage and can't play an instrument, but he is a phenomenally internationally well-known songwriter and lyricist, Vince Degiorgio. He is the guy who, in his old A and R days, signed NSYNC. He learned the music business and then became a full-time lyricist.
Two weeks ago he was in the Netherlands writing with their top act, Caro Emerald. When he wrote her album three years ago, her first album, it was number one on the Netherlands chart and beat out Michael Jackson's “Thriller”. He now is signing songwriters as a publisher in Canada. He is able to do that because he knows what the revenue flow is going to be from his portfolio of songs. He then is taking on those songwriters to have the same international career he has had.
As an organization, we're also focusing on helping our small businesses do that. We'll be going to Germany in the third week in September and to Denmark in the fourth week of September to meet labels and film and television producers and have a group of songwriters write with songwriters from the Nordic countries.
As soon as you have songs being marketed in three or four different territories, you're going to have a greater chance of success. The foreign market is key to allowing small businesses to survive. The Canadian market is too small. We have to look globally.
June 5th, 2018 / 5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Let's go on the fact that you're saying the Canadian market is too small. What's the size of the music industry within Canada, and who are, let's say, the top earners or the top money-makers within that ecosystem, which consists of the songwriters, producers, directors, choreographers, and conductors?
I have some data around international, but I really want to get a sense of how big Canada is.
Any of you could answer that question
5:10 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
I can speak about the performers and songwriters. Looking at all the songwriter and composer data for Canadian companies, and for money flowing through SOCAN and the other collectives, we estimated that it's about $700 million on the songwriters' side for Canadian participants.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
How much is the music industry? Which songwriters are about $700 million of that?
5:10 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
It would be over $1 billion.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Okay.
Of that $1 billion, where is most of the revenue generated? What are the top two revenue generators, streams of revenue coming in?
5:10 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Music Publishers Association
For our members, over 50% is coming from performance. Then, about 35% is coming from mechanical; that's the copies that are being made by these services. The growth area for our members is called synchronization, where they're looking to put a song into a commercial or a movie or a television.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
I have less than 30 seconds, and I want to go Mr. Willaert.
You were talking about Canadian musicians, and I think the singers are the only ones whose revenues have gone down, as opposed to everyone else in the ecosystem.
Can you give us a sense of the key driver of that?
