Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-03-12-Speech-1-145"
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"en.20070312.20.1-145"2
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"Madam President, I wish to begin by thanking the shadow rapporteurs and other colleagues in the Committee on Legal Affairs for the overwhelming support they have given me. The unanimous support of the Committee on Legal Affairs was a great honour and privilege for me.
My objective has been to find a good balance of interests, a balance between the necessary introduction of competition and cultural diversity, a balance between rights holders and users of music, a balance between big and small collecting societies, a balance between the big rights holders and niche authors and composers. I have tried to propose a European solution in a very difficult and sensitive domain and I hope that it has been successful for the European Union and that we all shall benefit from it.
Let me start by underlining the importance of the copyright sector, which represents 5-7 % of the EU’s GDP. It is therefore important to ensure that copyright and neighbouring rights in this increasingly growing digital domain are managed properly to the benefit of all involved.
For this reason, I have to say that I am not at all happy with the ‘soft law’ approach taken by the Commission, since it failed to involve the European Parliament and the Member States in regulating this area, which is of growing economic importance and therefore absolutely relevant to the proper functioning of the internal market.
The Commission has set a precedent in a very important and sensitive domain: by failing to consult Parliament or the Council, it has bypassed the democratic process. I believe we all agree that the legislative triangle cannot be ignored.
I am fully committed to the preservation of European cultural diversity. I believe that this issue should be placed in the front line of the debate. Any potential negative effects on cultural diversity in Europe must be avoided.
The Committee on Culture and Education has done an excellent job in highlighting the undesirable implications – one could even say negative effects – for cultural diversity of the Commission’s recommendation. As you may have noticed, the Culture Committee’s major concerns and demands, as well as compromise suggestions from all parties, are reflected in my report before you.
Summarising my report, I would like to say that my proposal preserves the reciprocal system of collecting societies in Europe, but makes sure that they all respect the principle of good governance. We will encourage and support the introduction of competition among collecting societies in a controlled manner and not the ‘big bang’ approach. We would like to guarantee that individual rights holders can continue to join the collecting society of their choice. We will promote the availability of the world repertoire for all collecting societies – large and small. We will argue for solidarity and equal treatment between authors and publishers affiliated to collecting societies. We will ensure that a few large rights holders cannot place the repertoire they control exclusively in the hands of a few large collecting societies, thereby creating an oligopoly situation in Europe. We would like to ensure that users of music from online and mobile services can obtain a one-stop shop when seeking a licence for the whole of Europe, but prevent them from forcing down the level of remuneration for authors. We would like to ensure that collecting societies can continue to play an indispensable role in promoting new and minority repertoire locally.
Finally, I would like to emphasise again that, by calling for a directive that reflects these objectives, we will demonstrate our overall support for strong cultural diversity in Europe.
During the improvement of the report, I tried to cooperate as closely as possible with all the interested parties – above all, the excellent shadow rapporteurs – to find the best and most balanced solution on this culturally and economically important area. I am very grateful for their precious advice and suggestions."@en1
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