Examination of Witnesses (Questions 118
- 119)
TUESDAY 6 JUNE 2006
BRITISH PHONOGRAPHIC
INDUSTRY
Q118 Chairman: Good morning and welcome
to the next part of our inquiry into new media and the challenges
and opportunities of the creative industries. We are aiming to
get through quite a lot of evidence this morning so could I ask
our witnesses to be succinct in their answers. To begin this morning,
can I welcome the BPI, representing the record companies, and
in particular Peter Jamieson, the Chairman, Roz Groome and Mark
Richardson. Can I apologise to Mark that I think you have been
left off the little sheet here, so for those who do not know Mark
he is Managing Director of Independiente Records; is that correct?
Mr Richardson: Yes; it is a South
American football team as well. Yes, it is an independent record
company in the UK.
Chairman: Thank you. I will ask Philip
Davies to begin.
Q119 Philip Davies: Much of the evidence
that we have received has focused on the copyright period of 50
years on sound recordings and whether or not that should be increased,
and I know the BPI favours an extension. One of the reasons is
that it will increase investment and distribution of new content;
but the National Consumer Council said the vast majority of profits
were made in the first years of release so it was very difficult
to see how an extension would lead to any increase in investment.
Could you explain to us exactly how an increase in copyright duration
would allow an increase in investment and distribution of new
content?
Mr Jamieson: Of course, the succinct
answer is, the first question demands quite a long answer because
it is a huge subject, but I will try to be very succinct. The
Consumer Council is opposed to an extension mainly on the basis
of price and availability, is my understanding, and our research,
which we have given to Gowers, shows that `out of copyright' recordings,
be it the music copyright or the sound recording copyright, have
never been a driver of price. Also we are in the dawn, and indeed
the reality, of a digital music age where, notwithstanding the
UK's current production, I think, and we have this wonderful music
industry which produced last year 31,000 albums and some 9,000
singles, notwithstanding that quantity of production, the availability
is going to be increased enormously because of the ability to
store digitally and make available to the public on a far, far
wider scale than ever before, because previously we have been
restricted by physical retail space. In terms of whether we want
music companies to be the owners of their recordings and marketing
them and returning income to a company which is, at the same time,
investing in new music, it is far preferable, in answer to your
specific point, than having opportunistic traders, anywhere round
the globe, simply profiting from Britain's crown jewels of music.
If I can go back a little bit in history, the 50-year term was
introduced at the turn of the 20th century when the average life
expectancy was around 50 years, when sound recordings were scratchy
things of very, very poor quality, they were not expected to last,
public domain was established, really for rare and esoteric recordings,
in the hope of enhanced preservation. It all changed in the fifties.
The long-play was introduced, it expanded creativity, it enabled
enduring popularity, increase in quality, it made music into a
global market; music is the culture which is one of Britain's
greatest ambassadors around the world now. Therefore, today, if
you look at it, that 50-year term—the average life expectancy,
for example, is 78 years—is redolent of a much earlier age,
and there is a danger, at the moment, if we simply lose control
of our crown jewels of British recordings in the fifties and sixties,
which are coming into the end of the current copyright period,
I think we are going to turn a prime export into almost an import.
I think we are going to be scattering the rights for these across
the globe, money will never be remitted back to the UK, neither
to the company nor to the artist, nor to the Exchequer, suddenly
it is going to become a global domain of British music that they
are all having the rights to reproduce and sell and not reinvest
in music and not return money to the UK. This is why we wish to
have the companies which have invested in the artists, and continue
to invest, have the rights for longer.
|
