Cavada report supports authors' remuneration

The European Parliament's culture committee has adopted a positive-looking report by Jean-Marie Cavada (France, EPP) on the online distribution of audiovisual works – the European Parliament’s follow-up report to the European Commission Green Paper from last year.

The report (adopted on 10th July with 26 votes in favour and 4 abstentions) has a number of very positive articles concerning the remuneration of authors:

  • “ Maintains that it is essential to guarantee authors remuneration that is fair and proportional to all forms of exploitation of their works, especially online exploitation, and therefore calls upon Member States to ban buyout contracts, which contradict this principle;”
  • “Calls for a rebalancing of the bargaining position between authors and performers vis-a-vis producers by providing authors and performers with an unwaivable right to remuneration for all forms of exploitation of their works, including ongoing remuneration when authors and performers have transferred their exclusive 'making available' right to a producer.”
  • “Maintains that the best means of guaranteeing decent remuneration for rights holders is through the preferred choice of either collective bargaining agreements, including agreed standard contracts, extended collective licenses, or collective management organisations;”

The report is now scheduled to be adopted by the European Parliament at the plenary session on 10th September 2012.