Madam Speaker, on June 10, I asked the Minister of Canadian Heritage a question about a press release from Mario Chenart, the head of the Société professionnelle des auteurs et compositeurs du Québec or SPACQ. In the newspapers that morning, Mr. Chenart wondered whether the heritage minister even cared. But rather than interpret his words, I will read his press release and we will see what he had to say. I would ask the parliamentary secretary, who is here, to give a detailed answer.
Mario Chenart wrote:
Yesterday, the Conservative government introduced a bill in the House to amend the Copyright Act. The SPACQ was quick to read the bill in the hopes that it would reflect what creators had been calling for. But we were bitterly disappointed.
In fact, this new bill, which the government describes as “fair, balanced and full of common sense”, is so bad for authors, composers and performers that we have to wonder where is the wonderful balance between consumers' needs and creators' rights that the government boasts it is maintaining.
First, the government is again refusing to extend the private copying levy to digital platforms. By limiting it to cassettes and CDs, the Conservative government is depriving authors and composers of this major source of revenue. When was the last time you copied music onto a cassette? To ask the question is to answer it. In the age of the iPod, most music is copied onto these sorts of platforms, which remain excluded from the system. For years, artists' groups have consistently called for a revamping of the private copying levy, but the current government's so-called balanced approach ignores this.
Second, likely in response to American demands, the government is making piracy illegal. This is something the SPACQ can only agree with. The problem is that the tools the legislation gives to copyright owners are insufficient and obsolete. The bill in no way addresses the monetization problems caused by the fact that consumers download 95% of content illegally from the web. Legislators continue to place the burden of taking legal action on copyright owners. As for service providers, their responsibility is limited to providing the copyright owner with the information needed to identify the offender.
Meanwhile, Internet service providers continue to profit from the use of their bandwidth with this loss leader. Knowing that the vast majority of the flow of funds generated by music downloads on the Internet benefits service providers, we have every right to question their technological and financial responsibility towards copyright holders. The Conservative government prefers to ignore these considerations, absolve them of their responsibility and take them out of the equation altogether.
So the question is this: what balance are they talking about? Do we have a heritage minister prepared to act as a counterbalance to the interests of industry and watch over our so-called heritage?
While the government can claim that its bill is the fruit of extensive, Canada-wide consultation...it is somehow difficult to have faith in any process to review the Copyright Act that does not invite artists to the table—neither the SPACQ nor the UDA [the Union des artistes du Québec] was invited to the discussion table. There is no question that Bill C-32 is an exact replica of its predecessor, Bill C-61, which died on the order paper right before the election. And this has all been spearheaded by a heritage minister working in tandem with an industry minister who will not guarantee that all of the music on his portable MP3 player was obtained in compliance with all copyright laws. But thanks anyway for the consultation.
The stakes remain high and, over the next few months, the SPACQ will continue to make representations to remind our elected officials of their responsibilities regarding the heritage of Canadian artists.
That was from an SPACQ press release.