Copyright Unit
Directorate General for Internal Market

STATEMENT

CEPIC (Coordination of European Picture Agencies Press  Stock Heritage ) has with great interest read the report on a Community framework for collecting societies for authors´ rights from Committee on Legal Affairs and the Internal Market, followed up by the Commission's Communication the Management of Copyright and Related Rights in the Internal Market.

We are very satisfied to notice the awareness of the necessity to intervene in the field of management of copyright and related rights. Our opinion is that it requires regulation for the interest of rights holders.

Some of the organisations that work in the collecting societies area do not  seem to consider the difference between the copyright creator and the copyright owner. It is very important that the money  goes to the correct recipient  As it is now museums, archives, picture agencies  and limited companies which have received in different ways the copyright to creative works do not get their part of the remuneration.

As the report points out there are a lack of procedural facilities for the collective management societies and  an absence of rapid dispute settlement mechanism.

The individual creator or the copyright owner of the economic part must have  the freedom to decide for themselves which right they wish to confer on collective management societies and which rights they wish to manage individually. This must be safeguarded by legislation.

We understand  that collecting societies are a good way to collect remuneration for some of the copyright owners rights, which could be difficult to receive in some other way. Therefore there are even more needs for the rights to be appropriately regulated in order to ensure the transparency required under competition law. We find it necessary to create common tools and comparable parameters for all the collecting societies throughout Europe.

In some countries there are vehicles which chose which organisations that can enter a special collecting society. As it is now,  in some collecting societies the members within the societies are voting on membership without  considering  if the organisations fulfil the requirement or not. As some of the members run the risk of receiving less money if more organisations in the same area become members of that collecting society.  They vote against excepting more members which would dilute their own income.

It is even so that in the statues some collecting societies every single member has a veto against accepting new members. This cannot be according to transparency throughout Europe.
It should be better that for example, the justice department decides if  an organisation fulfils the
criteria for membership of a collecting society, especially if there is a law  - as in the Nordic countries -  legislates that remuneration should be collected by such an organisation.

If there is a dispute which cannot be solved by the collecting society itself such a body within the justice department could be the  entity for solving the problems or the problem could be solved by the court. However it is needed that there is a possibility to go to EU for an opinion in a
special case.

It is also important as it is stressed in the report that internal democratic structures of collective management societies are fundamental for legitimising their activity. The establishment of minimum standards for organisational structures, transparency, accounting and legal remedies is
necessary.

Groups of copyright owners should be entitle to exercise rights to send representatives of their choice with voting rights to members meetings,  and that such right-holders should be taken into consideration when members of management bodies are being appointed.

Participation should be on the basis of equal entitlement of all the various member groups. It is also necessary that the financial figures  and division of the remuneration  is not a secret inside the collecting society only seen by a few.

For the sake of transparency the yearly economic reports should be open for everybody. It is also important that the amount of revenue is divided on the principle of identical treatment
in identical circumstances.

We look forward to an efficient, independent, regular, transparent and expert control mechanism in all Member States - incorporating all the legal, social, financial and cultural aspects.

We also agree upon  comparable and compatible arbitration mechanism throughout the EU, access to which is affordable by small users and small authors, for disputes between right-holders and collective management societies, between one collecting society and another and between collecting societies and copyright owners outside the collecting society.

There is also need for an appropriate procedure for the cross-border settlement of conflicting decisions in the member countries.

We also wish to see increased requirement for collective management societies to provide information, internally and externally and publications of tariffs, distribution keys, annual accounts and information on reciprocal agreements. We wish collective management societies to be accountable to those they represent in terms of their expenditure on administration and other associated costs. Information on administration and how a collective management society is run should be available, so that rights-holders can ensure that their money is not being wasted on unnecessary administrative expenses.

However we are not in favour of a one stop shop in the picture business where we believe that the market place is already on the Internet which provides opportunity for all users to receive what they want with competition all over the world on transparent prices and not in a monopolistic way.
However, we believe that the existing individualised system of rights and fees management has proven itself to be efficient and reward rights-holders precisely and appropriately for their work. This system should be retained, and used preferentially where a use can be traced back to an individual rights-holder who can be remunerated in full. Collective management should remain the last resort and be limited to mass usages that are difficult to control; where the individual rights-holder cannot be identified and where such small payments are difficult to collect individually.

Although a rationalisation of rights management is welcomed, we believe that any collective administration systems created should not be mandatory, and that rights-holders participation should be voluntary. Indeed, ensuring that there is not a monopoly in a particular area of collective management will allow rights-holders a choice, and transparency of action and freely available information on societies, will permit the rights-holder to make an informed choice.

It is also important to give a appropriate management costs in such a way as to be comprehensible to those entitled to benefit.

We are also in favour of uniform coding standards for work and as CEPIC  represent almost 90 percent of the picture industry in Europe we are willing to participate in developing such standards suitable for the picture business.

END OF STATEMENT
18.06.04