As I mentioned, it is something that was recommended by this committee as part of the copyright review. I think what it seeks to do is strike a balance between what we now face as an obligation under the treaty.... The committee also noted that it would not extend the term of copyright, but for an obligation under one of these treaties, and now we face that.
What registration would do is essentially say that we will meet the international standard of the Berne Convention of life plus 50, and that Berne Convention does not allow you to put forward registration requirements. That's for the standard of the life plus 50. For that additional 20 years, that effectively can fall outside that registration requirement found in the Berne Convention, so we can therefore say that we are at life plus 50 plus 20. We will give the option to extend the term of copyright so, if you have witnesses and others who say they think they would benefit from term extension from that extra 20 years, they can get it.
However, for the overwhelming majority of works, people don't have those same kinds of concerns, and they are oftentimes happy for it to enter into the public domain. Bear in mind that we're talking about the life of the author and now 50 years after they've passed away. Those would fall into the public domain without that extension. I think it would put Canada in the position of really being a model for how to more effectively deal with term extension, and into a better job of striking the balance between, on the one hand, providing protection for those who want it while, on the other hand, doing what we can to preserve the harm that comes from term extension.