International Trade committee  I do not have any specific studies myself, but thank you for the question. We have looked at those studies in New Zealand and Australia. They're purely based on the notion that term extension will cost consumers because they'll continue to pay for physical products that would otherwise have gone into the public domain.

International Trade committee  I certainly hope you're paying for it, sir.

International Trade committee  Yes, absolutely, I thoroughly agree with you. I think the notion in the world that we can access things online easily does not mean that we should be accessing them for free. The reality is that, down the line, if we don't correct this issue, people won't be creating. The reality is that a creative society is not one that imports all its intellectual property; it's one that creates it.

International Trade committee  Absolutely. As a matter of fact, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development worldwide has cited Canada as one of the weakest jurisdictions for IP protection, purely because life plus 70 isn't in effect in Canada.

International Trade committee  Yes

International Trade committee  In what context, sir?

International Trade committee  Sir, my music publisher's opinion is that freedom to operate is not freedom to utilize somebody else's intellectual property to your advantage without compensation to the creators and originators of that intellectual property.

International Trade committee  That's a great question. I would answer you by saying we have to look at how many jobs will be lost if we don't, more so than jobs that are created. Our members are trying to sell products into foreign markets. It's the only growth market for our members, by selling musical compositions to TV pilots and movies, into foreign markets, and so on.

International Trade committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for having me today. I appreciate it. Music publishers are businesses that own, administer, and control the rights to musical compositions. These compositions are the foundation of the entire music industry. The music industry in Canada represents more than $4 billion of economic activity annually.

International Trade committee  I will try to be fast. The elephant in the room is the notion advanced that consumers will suffer. This is simply false. The physical scale model has been replaced by a streaming model. Buying music will be supplanted long before any hypothetical consumer impact takes place. The Canadian business model is based on investment at the bottom level, and music publishers are doing that.