Brussels, 26 July 2022
See question(s) : E-001886/2022
EN
E-001886/2022
Answer given by Mr Breton on behalf of the European Commission
(26.7.2022)
The Commission agrees on the importance of ensuring a level playing field in the internal market, including in the area of copyright. As the Honourable Members rightly point out there is already a high level of harmonisation achieved by the EU copyright legislation for categories of rightholders namely authors, performers, record producers, film producers and database makers.
In the audiovisual industry, the Rental and Lending Directive and the Satellite and Cable Directive1 provide that the principal director should be one of the authors and Member States may provide for others to be considered co-authors. Therefore, Member States have the option of including other creative professionals such as camera operators, editors and sound masters.
The recently adopted copyright reform2 lays down rules aiming at further increasing the level of harmonisation and improving the remuneration of creators. These rules have not yet been fully implemented and the Commission is currently focused on making sure that all Member States adopt the necessary national measures. The Commission does not have specific information on the situation in the Member States described in the written question but remain available to hear more details.
1 Directive 2006/115/EC on rental and lending rights, https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legalcontent/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32006L0115&from=EN, Directive 1993/83/EEC on satellite broadcasting
and cable retransmission https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri=celex%3A31993L0083
2 Chapter 3 of Directive (EU) 2019/790 on Copyright and Related rights in the Digital Single Market https://eurlex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2019/790/oj
Source – EU Parliament: Answer to a written question – Gaps in the harmonisation of copyright and neighbouring rights and disparity in the remuneration of artists – E-001886/2022(ASW)