Industry Committee on Sept. 19th, 2018

[Jérôme Payette]

I think that culturally, yes, we have strong creators and a system that allows culture to be vibrant.

On the copyright side and the remuneration...and we have to understand that copyright is not subsidy. It's private income that's incoming for the exploitation of the work.

This really brings down the competitiveness of Canada: not having enough money coming in from the digital services, or not having strong legislative or other kinds of things to address copyright. The rates of things should be faster. We have to really make changes to follow what's happening in Europe and the United States to be more competitive on the copyright side.

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

Who is benefiting from our lack of competitiveness? Who are the chief benefactors of our lack of competitiveness with copyright?

[Jérôme Payette]

Those benefiting from weak copyright are the users, and mainly right now the online platforms and digital companies.

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

Mr. Tacit, do you have any comment about that? From the perspective of smaller ISPs, are they competitive in Canada? Is it competitive right now?

[Christian Tacit]

You don't want to open that debate now. There's not enough time left.

We actually just participated in a Competition Bureau market study and discussed all of the severe anti-competitive problems that exist in Canada for the smaller ISP sector. I don't want to take us off track, but I would be happy to share that with you, or anyone else who wants it. There are significant structural barriers to competition.

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

Related to copyright, directly...?

[Christian Tacit]

I don't know about that. I think it's related to competition, generally. I don't want to stray into other areas that I know less about and are not my domain.

All I can say is this: If there's any kind of rebalancing that needs to take place in the digital era between streamers and those who provide content on a digital platform or whatever, that's great and fine, and this committee should make those recommendations, because the times are changing. What I don't want to see compromised, because it is a fundamental part of our competitiveness as a nation, is the rule of law. We are very much a country founded on the rule of law, where we take individual rights very seriously. People do come to this country, and have come in droves recently, because of that. Anything we do to weaken that is going to adversely affect our competitiveness adversely.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Masse, you have seven minutes.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm tempted, but I'm not going to take the bait. The parliamentary secretary, Mr. Lametti, knows my position on notice and notice, and notice and take down. I don't need my blood pressure to go up at the moment with regard to that.

I do want to make a point though. We have had several interventions about issues on YouTube. I don't want to be seen as picking on something, but I want to at least create an alternative perspective.

It was raised that Justin Bieber got his start on YouTube, but the reality is that YouTube also did very well financially from that relationship. In fact, you go to YouTube right now, and it has a burger on it from a food chain that's advertising on it. They have Fortnite and other things. YouTube has done very well through its relationship with those who have had some success with the platform, by posting your stuff.... In many places it's a public risk, putting some of your stuff up on YouTube. People should think about that.

Where we're at now is that this committee is reviewing a five-year change. We are going to make recommendations to the minister, if we can agree as a committee. That hasn't been decided yet.

That's the extent of what's happening, here. No legislation has been proposed. That would take the minister coming back and, first of all, answering this committee, if he so chooses. There is a statutory time frame for that. There can also be an extension that could run us quite late. Then on top of that, there would have to be perhaps specific instructions to Parliament, if the act would be amended, by tabling in the House of Commons, and it would have to go through a series of legislative processes to eventually get to the Senate and then passed.

There is quite a distance here, and there are different ways to get to that distance.

If you have comments, about what takes place, priorities.... What do you think if say, for example, we do nothing? That could be the end result for the 2019 or 2020. It's a reality that is out there with regard to the current act that's in place. I'd like your thoughts on that, if you have any. I think it needs to be something that's stated, especially given that we've seen what's happening in Europe and the United States, as of yesterday

[Michael Paris]

I'll get it out of the way very quickly. On the sole issue that I'm talking about, which is the definition of sound recording, we're quite content and in favour of the committee leaving it undisturbed.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

That's fair. That's what I'm looking for.

[Christian Tacit]

I have one comment. Motion isn't always progress. Just because things are being done, it doesn't mean that they're the right things. As a country, I think we have to figure out what's right for our country to do overall. We have to balance a whole bunch of rights and work within the framework that we have.

[Jérôme Payette]

As I said, I think the provisions regarding network services should be reviewed.

The Canadian safe harbours need to be looked at because they're very wide and there are different companies operating under the Canadian safe harbours right now. The digital platforms are some of them and Europe has moved on this. That's one.

I think private copying is something important. There was a system that was bringing in $40 million every year, but because the law was not technologically neutral, now we have only a few million remaining. Those are two related points to focus on.

[Stéphanie Hénault]

To encourage innovation, people have to be compensated. Our most talented screenwriters who write television series, who work from 6 am to 10 pm to create audiovisual works that have very high ratings in French-speaking Canada are increasingly poorly paid, even though their television series are being more widely shown. Things have to change to encourage them to continue their work. Otherwise, in a very short time, screenwriters will no longer want to do this kind of work, and neither will their children when they grow up. In sectors where people are not compensated, the talent will dry up.

As Mr. Payette said, value has been transferred not to our local presenters but to foreign presenters, to the GAFAs that monetize a great deal of cultural content. We have to restore the balance; otherwise there will be no incentive for creativity and cultural innovation, for the economic activity it generates, for the tourists it attracts or for Canadian values.

Culture definitely has an economic component, but it also has to be preserved because it is essential. We have a duty economically speaking to ensure that talented creators stay here and can earn a living from their work.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I did make a reference to Fortnite. If there are members of Parliament who aren't familiar with it, please let me know when you're going online, so that I can teach you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

On that note, I would like to thank our guests for coming in today and sharing with us their experiences and their knowledge. Obviously, this is a large and complex file. We still have a lot of work ahead of us.

These are good, hard questions because we need to be able to get information out. That's what's going to help us write this report.

As they say in the movie industry, that's a wrap. We're adjourned for the day.