Work has resumed at the European Parliament on the draft directive on copyright. The shadow rapporteurs met on Thursday 11 January to discuss the idea of ‘fair remuneration,’ but only addressed the duty of transparency, leaving aside the more controversial possible right of revocation.
The draft directive introduces new exceptions to copyright rules, encouraging licensing contracts and laying down new rules to ensure proper functioning of the market for the use of protected works and other objects. Neither the Council nor the European Parliament have yet decided on a negotiating position for the text, although it was unveiled in September 2016. according to the Council’s provisional timeline, the issue will not be on the agenda of the competitiveness ministers until 12 March and may be the subject of a presidency information point at the meeting on 28 May. In Parliament, MEPs were due to express their views on 25 January, but the vote has been postponed until 26-27 March (or later).
Progress at Parliament on Article 14
Article 14. At their meeting on 11 January, the shadow rapporteurs focussed on Article 14 on the duty of transparency, without discussing Article 14a on a contractual duty for ‘fair, proportionate and appropriate’ remuneration.
The draft compromise on Article 14 suggests laying down that the duty of transparency also applies to third parties, but not to agreements reached with collective copyright collection bodies or agreements with individual authors or artists based on collective negotiation or equivalent measures. We understand that the talks are making good progress and a solution might be reached at the next meeting of the shadow rapporteurs on 18 January in Strasbourg.
In terms of Article 14a, rapporteur Axel Voss (EPP, Germany), is reported to be planning to address this question in the talks on Article 13 (use of protected material).
Articles 15 and 16. The participants did not discuss the other articles relating to fair remuneration, viz. the content adjustment mechanism (Article 15) and the dispute settlement mechanism (Article 16), or the related recitals. For Article 15, the draft compromise allowed authors’ representatives to renegotiate remuneration, adding that this best-seller clause would apply to a change of circumstances during the contract. For Article 16, the draft compromise on the table foresees that the dispute settlement mechanisms would also be accessible to collective rights collection bodies.
After the meeting, rapporteur Axel Voss reportedly suggested holding a meeting of the shadow rapporteurs each week in order to finalise the compromise by the end of March or early April. The next meeting is scheduled for 18 January in Strasbourg. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)