Select Committee calls for copyright extension

Consumers should be allowed to copy music or movies they have bought for personal use within their own homes without being penalised, a report from the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee has said.

In the report published today it said this right should include the freedom to copy to portable gadgets such as mp3 players, and other devices owned or used regularly by the household as long as the copied material was not made available to others.

However, the Committee has also called for copyright protection on sound recordings to be extended to at least 70 years. It said this will enable artists and their families to benefit from any recordings they have made throughout their lifetime.

Currently copyright protection on sound recordings only lasts 50 years from date of release. However, the creators of works such as books and films enjoy copyright protection for their life, plus an additional 70 years.

This recommendation mirrors the growing pressure to increase the copyright terms. Earlier this month in an Early Day Motion signed by 75 MPs, Labour MP Michael Connarty proposed that the 50 year cut-off is unfair.

These calls for an extension to copyright terms on sound recordings essentially reject the conclusions reached by Andrew Gowers in his Review of Intellectual Property. Published in December 2006 and backed by the Treasury, Gowers' overall view was companies had had enough influence over the law, and that they should gain no more rights.

He even said in an interview with online legal publication, OutLaw that he actually considered shortening the copyright term; he said he pulled back from the plan because it was "politically prudent" to do so.

The Select Committee, however, said it had "not heard a convincing reason why a composer and his or her heirs should benefit from a term of copyright which extends for lifetime and beyond, but a performer should not”.

It said the rejection of an extension to copyright term failed to take account of the moral right of creators to choose to retain ownership and control of their own intellectual property.

Among other recommendations in the report, the result of an 18-month inquiry into the effects that new technologies have on creative content, the Committee has also called for new measures to help tackle piracy.

It wants the level of damages in cases of copyright infringement to be clearly set out in law and to make it illegal to camcord a film being shown in a cinema.

The Committee also looked at the role of the internet and of social networking websites in distributing unlicensed creative material. It said the influence they have meant internet service providers and internet search-based businesses must to do more to discourage piracy and take more responsibility for dealing with unlicensed material.

It suggested this could be done by establishing a proactive body to examine claims that unlicensed material is being made available.

Welcoming the report's recommendations, the British Phonographic Industry, BPI chief executive Geoff Taylor said: "We urge the Government to respond positively to the Select Committee and now make the case in Europe for fair copyright protection for British performers and record companies.

“We are pleased that the Committee recognised that there is much more that ISPs can and should do to help prevent internet piracy, although the recommendation for a new industry body requires further consideration."