Paying for Retransmission - the Screenrights case
As the Australian reported on Monday:
'AUSTRALIA'S pay-TV industry and the Screenrights copyright collection agency will today start a three-week court battle to determine the amount the pay-TV sector should pay copyright owners for the use of programs shown on retransmitted free-to-air TV signals ...
[A]fter three years of negotiations, Screenrights and the pay-TV industry's peak group (the Australian Subscription TV and Radio Association) were unable to reach agreement on what fee was reasonable and Screenrights took action in the Copyright Tribunal – part of the Federal Court – last year.
The first hearing, held last October, focused on the legal framework and covered the operation of retransmission schemes overseas. But the latest hearing is set to determine what will be considered a reasonable payment.
The pay-TV sector argues only a nominal fee should be payable to the underlying rights holders, which include TV program producers and Hollywood movie studios.
In other words, the big issue in this case is: should Pay-TV operators be paying nothing, or almost nothing, to re-transmit free-to-air television? Or should they pay some amount, eg some amount per consumer, to do so?
The debate going on in the Copyright Tribunal does play in an interesting way with the Explanatory Memorandum to the Copyright Amendment (Film Directors' Rights) Amendment Bill 2005, currently before Parliament. That Bill aims to give Film Directors new rights:
In other words, this Explanatory Memorandum characterises the Part VC license, introduced in 2000, as a 'new revenue stream'. The Government apparently thinks there IS money in this statutory license. Which kind of puts paid to an argument by Pay TV operators that the fee should be nothing, or nominal!!!'Film directors make a major creative contribution to the film making process. Other than moral rights, Australian copyright law does not currently recognise this contribution, while other creators involved in the making of a film such as screenwriters and composers are recognised. The Government considers that there is a need to amend the Copyright Act to give, for the first time, film directors a copyright in the films they direct.
This Bill provides rights to directors to share, as copyright owners, in remuneration for the retransmission of films included in free-to-air broadcasts.
The amendments to the Copyright Act 1968 provide for film directors to be joint copyright owners of their films, along with producers, for the purposes of the retransmission statutory licence in Part VC of the Copyright Act. The retransmission statutory licence allows free-to-air broadcasts to be retransmitted without permission from copyright owners provided the retransmitter pays fair remuneration for the owners of copyright in the underlying materials in broadcasts, including films and pre-recorded programs. Under the amendments, the directors and producers would share a right to part of this remuneration, as joint owners of the copyright in their films for this purpose'
