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IMPALA criticises changes to private copy levy in Spain

By | Published on Monday 30 July 2012

IMPALA

Various creative industry trade groups in Europe, including indie label trade body IMPALA, have hit out at changes to private copy compensation in Spain.

In most European countries copyright law allows consumers to make private back-up copies of recordings they buy, but adds a levy to devices and consumables used in the making of such copies, which is paid collectively to the rights owners whose work is being copied. Traditionally the levy was applied to blank cassettes and CDRs, though in the digital age, where back-up copies are made to PCs, smartphones and digital lockers, countries where the system applies have had to work out where to apply the levy instead. Needless to say, the makers of any devices that levies may be attached to have generally hit out at any plans to do so.

In Spain the levy was initially applied to “media content storage devices”, but earlier this year the country’s then newish government repealed that measure, and instead said that rights owners would be compensated by the government directly.

More details of how that will work have now been revealed, and the proposals have met with criticism from rights owners, who say that the new approach makes the measure a ‘subsidy’ rather than a right under copyright, while adding that the sum of money the Spanish government proposes to hand over is far too low. IMPALA and others also say the new system ignores obligations under European Law.

In a statement last week, the various trade bodies wrote: “This change contradicts the aim of developing a creative economy and it also goes against EU law on copyright and the internal market. The Spanish government is now proposing a ridicule subsidy of five million euros per year to compensate for the same economic damage. Meanwhile, the prices of consumer goods used for copying have not been reduced since the levy was abolished”.

“The new system in Spain cuts the link between the act of private copying and the payment of fair compensation due to right holders. [But] such a royalty system cannot be assimilated to a tax. Private copying remuneration is not state aid. It is a system developed at international and EU level to encourage and reward artists as the main agents of creative, cultural and entertainment activities. We therefore call on the Spanish government to comply with EU law and to respect artists and the cultural and creative industries, by reinstating the previously existing compensation system for private copying”.

As previously reported, in the UK there is no levy system because no private copy right exists under British copyright law (even though everyone makes private copies). The recent Hargreaves Review of copyright laws proposed introducing such a private copy right, but without a levy, something the UK music industry is likely to oppose.



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