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37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Tuesday, June 3, 2003

0910

The Chair (Mr. Clifford Lincoln (Lac-Saint-Louis, Lib.))

Mr. Roch Carrier (National Librarian, National Library of Canada)

Mr. Ian Wilson (National Archivist, National Archives of Canada)

Mr. Roch Carrier

0915

0920

Mr. Ian Wilson

0925

0930

Mr. Roch Carrier

0935

Mr. Ian Wilson

0940

Mr. Chuck Strahl (Fraser Valley, Canadian Alliance)

The Chair

Mr. Roch Carrier

The Chair

Mr. Roch Carrier

Mr. Ian Wilson

0945

Mr. Roch Carrier

Mr. Ian Wilson

Mr. Chuck Strahl

Mr. Ian Wilson

The Chairman

Mr. Chuck Strahl

0950

Mr. Roch Carrier

Mr. Chuck Strahl

Mr. Ian Wilson

0955

Mr. Chuck Strahl

The Chair

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold (Jonquière)

Mr. Roch Carrier

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold

1000

Mr. Roch Carrier

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold

Mr. Roch Carrier

The Chair

Ms. Sarmite Bulte (Parkdale—High Park, Lib.)

1005

Mr. Ian Wilson

Ms. Sarmite Bulte

Mr. Ian Wilson

Ms. Sarmite Bulte

Mr. Ian Wilson

Ms. Sarmite Bulte

Mr. Ian Wilson

Ms. Sarmite Bulte

Mr. Ian Wilson

Ms. Sarmite Bulte

The Chair

Ms. Sarmite Bulte

The Chair

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP)

1010

Mr. Ian Wilson

Mr. Roch Carrier

The Chair

1100

1105

Mr. Michel Beauchemin (Coordinator, Droit d'auteur / Multimédia-Internet / Copyright (DAMIC))

1110

Ms. Marian Hebb (Legal Counsel, Creators Copyright Coalition)

1115

Mr. Michel Beauchemin

The Chair

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne (Director General, Société professionnelle des auteurs et des compositeurs du Québec, Droit d'auteur / Multimédia-Internet / Copyright (DAMIC))

1120

The Chair

Ms. Janet Lunn (Past Chair, Writers' Union of Canada)

1125

The Chair

Ms. Marian Hebb

The Chair

Mr. Fred Hosking (President, Public History Inc.)

1130

1135

The Chair

Mr. Howard Knopf (Copyright Lawyer, As Individual)

1140

1145

The Chair

Mr. Howard Knopf

The Chair

Mr. Howard Knopf

The Chair

Mr. Chuck Strahl

1150

Mr. Fred Hosking

The Chair

Mr. Réal Ménard (Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, BQ)

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne

1155

Mr. Réal Ménard

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne

Mr. Réal Ménard

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne

Mr. Réal Ménard

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne

Mr. Réal Ménard

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne

The Chair

Mr. Alex Shepherd (Durham, Lib.)

Ms. Marian Hebb

The Chair

Mr. Alex Shepherd

The Chair

Mr. Fred Hosking

1200

The Chair

Ms. Marian Hebb

The Chair

Ms. Liza Frulla (Verdun—Saint-Henri—Saint-Paul—Pointe Saint-Charles, Lib.)

Mr. Michel Beauchemin

The Chair

Ms. Wendy Lill

Ms. Marian Hebb

1205

The Chair

CANADA

Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage

NUMBER 042

2nd SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Tuesday, June 3, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

¿ (0910)

[English]

The Chair (Mr. Clifford Lincoln (Lac-Saint-Louis, Lib.)): I declare open the meeting of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage.

[Translation]

The committee is sitting to study Bill C-36, an Act to establish the Library and Archives of Canada, to amend the Copyright Act and to amend certain Acts in consequence.

[English]

I would like to mention to members that we are going to hear our two main witnesses until 10 o'clock. At 10 o'clock, the committee will meet in camera to examine future business for half an hour. We have a couple of motions and an item to consider regarding the copyright review that's coming up before us. Then we'll resume the regular open meeting at 10:30 to hear further witnesses in regard to Bill C-36.

At this point I'm very pleased to welcome Mr. Ian Wilson, the national archivist, and from la Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, Monsieur Roch Carrier, national librarian, both of whom are well known to all of us and whose reputations precede them.

I'll give the floor to you, Monsieur Carrier.

[Translation]

Mr. Roch Carrier (National Librarian, National Library of Canada): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. On behalf of my colleague, Ian Wilson, and all the employees of the National Library and the National Archives, I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, for your attention this morning, and for the time you have committed to our project. This project is an exciting one and almost all our employees are committed to it. We firmly believe that this is a project for the future.

[English]

Mr. Ian Wilson (National Archivist, National Archives of Canada): Mr. Chairman, honourable members, Monsieur Carrier and I have the privilege of leading and of representing two of Canada's extraordinary institutions, distinguished in many decades of service, distinguished by long tradition, distinguished by their collections, distinguished by the expertise of their staff.

The National Archives was formed just a few years following Confederation as the first active cultural program of the new Government of Canada. It was established very deliberately as a cultural institution to provide inquirers and authors with access to the authentic original records of the Canadian experience.

One of my predecessors, the second Dominion Archivist, Sir Arthur Doughty--and I might add, I'm simply the seventh national archivist since 1872, and Monsieur Carrier is the fourth national librarian since the establishment of the National Library in 1953--commented at one point on his ambition for the National Archives, and he wrote:

Of all national assets, archives are the most precious; they're the gift of one generation to another and the extent of our care of them marks the extent of our civilization.

He began an extraordinary collection process, acquiring, yes, the official records of the Government of Canada, but also, recognizing that we needed to repatriate our colonial records, beginning to acquire materials in the private sector, beginning to acquire portraits, documentary art, publications, material in all formats--documenting and recording the Canadian experience. He put it on display, and many of the collections he acquired now form the basis of the National War Museum. They're in the Museum of Civilization and elsewhere, because up until the 1960s, the archives and library were in fact the museum, the public place to understand and approach the history of Canada.

But in the 21st century we're in an information age. The convergence of information storage and telecommunications, really, is changing the needs and the expectations of Canadians about access to information concerning Canada, concerning our society, concerning what we, as a society, have done together. They expect access. They want these national institutions to be relevant to them, to open up the materials that allow them to understand their history, their community, and their experience first-hand. They're finding for the very first time that the collections of the library and archives--the newspapers and city directories, the immigration records, census records, and war records, etc.--document the Canadian experience in great detail, and they expect access.

In an information society, we very much believe and our staff sincerely believe that the Library and Archives of Canada should not be an institution used just by scholars--and we will maintain our services to scholarship--but it also has to be increasingly relevant to Canadians of all ages, all across Canada, wherever they live. That is our ambition today.

[Translation]

Mr. Roch Carrier: My colleague emphasized the impact of technological change. Let me just give you one little example. For instance, in the National Library of Canada, we have a music department. Formerly, we would receive 300 researchers each year. Now that we are on line, we are getting more than 100,000 hits a month. This gives an example of the wide-open access that Canadians now have to this unique collection.

Ian and I were appointed at about the same time. Before our appointment, we read the English report, a highly authoritative report, with a vision sometimes like that of the Massey-Lévesque report, which had such an impact in its day. The English report proposes between both organizations a collaboration that perhaps did not exist formerly. Ian and I discussed this report. We talked it over and we saw that there were many opportunities for us to work together.

For various historical reasons, there were some rather puzzling divisions. For instance, Ian is entrusted with cartoons, or caricatures in newspapers; but I am entrusted with newspapers. I am entrusted with voices; Ian is entrusted with the images that go with the voices, etc. So as both of us are fairly pragmatic, we agreed that this did not make sense and that it would make sense to gather together the great wealth with which we are entrusted, which is the wealth of Canada's documentary heritage. We are in charge of gathering this heritage, of organizing it so that it can be accessed in the future.

In the National Library and the National Archives of Canada, no documents are lost. We have a system for identifying documents and for retracing them. We also have a great responsibility to the nation to safeguard these documents, because if we lose documents today, then in 50 years or 300 years, no one will be able to access them. Our institutions are all about access.

Of course, we realize that we have a committed professional workforce. The personnel working at the archives and at the libraries were perhaps the first professionals to understand and use the potential of new technology to improve accessibility. All in all, we are facing the same challenge with regard to resources, which is long-term conservation.

So, after talking things over, we began to implement the changes recommended in the English report and we realized that this should logically lead to further progress. This is how we began to develop what we call our vision for the future of the institution.

What does this vision involve? What will the Library and the Archives of Canada look like? Of course, we are working in continuity with the past, and we have opted for change. Now, two organizations cannot be merged without changing them. Change is the magic word. We are changing two institutions into a new institution called the Library and Archives of Canada, a unique, modern institution committed to meeting the changing needs of the Canadian government and of all Canadians.

The main purpose of the Library and Archives of Canada is to preserve and to make accessible the most important part of our heritage, namely the record of Canadian experience, and the knowledge that Canadians, in their great diversity, have gathered in every part of Canada. We have the know-how for facing challenges which are sometimes universal and which we, as Canadians, have been able to solve in our march towards the future.

¿ (0915)

The new institution will also play a role in facilitating the access to the information Canadians need. Our country is huge and no one should be left out when it comes to accessibility. Communication technology now gives easy access to the relevant information one is looking for, from the north, the south, the east or the west. Thus, we will be a basic resource for education and we know that everywhere in Canada, education needs some help, some support, and our collection will be there to help those who need it.

How will we bring this vision about? There are four points. First, we will continue gathering an exhaustive collection of documents that belong to the Canadian heritage, and reflect the ever-increasing diversity of our evolving population and also reflect the many facets of the search for knowledge.

We will conserve these documents adequately. We will organize them so that they can be found later; they will be organized in an expert way. Finally, through accessibility, we will make this wealth available to all Canadians.

¿ (0920)

[English]

Mr. Ian Wilson: Roch has mentioned the comprehensive collection. Let me tell you a few things about this collection that he and I are now responsible for. Few Canadians know about it. Few Canadians know the extent, the depth, the detail that is available to them, because it consists and will consist of all forms of documentation, the documentary heritage of Canada. Much of it is unique. It exists in one copy. It's irreplaceable. It's fragile. It's unavailable elsewhere. It by and large focuses entirely on Canada and the Canadian experience. It is multi-media, because for a hundred years we have been collecting all forms of documentary material reflecting Canada, Canada's diversity, the complexity of this country.

We have now some 19 million books and periodicals. We have extensive newspaper collections of Canada, microfilms from many sources of newspapers and city directories. It contains literary manuscripts. Between our two collections, we have the papers of many noted Canadian writers and their organizations. We have the extensive collection of the publications of the Government of Canada.

These are complemented now by 156 kilometres of unique government and non-government textual records. If you took all the boxes in the archives and laid them side by side down the road, it would go from here almost to Montreal. In there are the complete records of the cabinet. These are the orders in council. These are--as I look at that painting above us--the Fathers of Confederation. We have the private papers of many of the Fathers of Confederation.

When I look behind me at the painting of the memorial at Vimy Ridge, we have the complete service file of every Canadian who fought in World War I and World War II. We have the war diaries from Vimy Ridge and all the other battles of the first war. We have the immigration records. We have most of the census records. We have the records of New France. We have the records of the British colonial regime. We have the papers of individuals in all walks of life involved in business, and the records of many Canadian unions, clubs, and associations--organizations that have made this country what it is. We have the records of political parties and political leaders from all sides of the House of Commons.

It's an extraordinary collection. Those are just the textual records.

We have 21 million photographs of people, places, and events in Canada, from the 1840s to yesterday. That includes the entire collection of Yousuf Karsh as a photographer. We have extraordinary images of native leaders across the west done by the Hind expedition in the 1850s--extraordinary images of faces and people. With these are portraits that represent more than one million Canadians--for example, the four oil paintings done of the four Mohawk leaders who met with Queen Anne in London in 1710, painted by the court painter Verelst. We have those originals. We just acquired paintings of Governor Vaudreuil and his wife, the only couple from La Nouvelle France and the only Canadian to be governor of La Nouvelle France.

We have nearly three million maps. We have documentary art, 300,000 works of art documenting landscape and events in Canadian history in the 17th, 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. We have broadcast materials and have agreements with many broadcasters to record broadcast heritage, one of the most elusive forms of our heritage.

We have agreements now for film, and I think we have some 50,000 titles in our Canadian film collection, beginning about 1898. We have sound recordings, the music in the library, the archives, as well as many other recordings, beginning, I believe, with Lord Stanley in the 1880s--a voice recording--Mackenzie King dedicating the carillon in the Peace Tower in 1927, and the war reporters reporting from D-Day. In a couple of days we will mark the anniversary of D-Day. We have the recordings of the Canadian reporters who broadcast back, and General Vanier, as the first Canadian in the gates at Auschwitz, telling listeners on CBC and Radio-Canada what he saw.

¿ (0925)

This is an extraordinary collection, which brings Canadian history to life. It is the fundamental legal record of the Government of Canada. It is also the official record of Canadian society. It is multimedia. It reflects all of us, all of our families, and our communities.

We want to ensure that we continue to develop the collection, because there are many things that keep appearing. With our partners, 21,000 libraries and 800 archives across the country, we want to ensure that there are national strategies to ensure that the collections housed in libraries and archives reflect the full diversity of Canadian society, using all media forms, including new media, such as the Internet.

The bill provides for the sampling of material available publicly, without restriction, that is currently on the Internet. It would allow the new institution to sample that for preservation purposes and to ensure Canadian knowledge and awareness, and the development of Canadian society, both for those who put it up and may wonder, five years from now, what they had online, through to future generations that will want to understand the Internet phenomenon and what that form of communication meant for Canadian creativity.

I must stress that much of this legislation is based on existing legislation from either the National Archives or the National Library. The first act for the National Archives was passed in 1912 and updated in the 1980s. The National Library Act was passed in 1953.

We have updated and modernized the terminology, and harmonized the use of terms between the library and the archive sides, but will continue with the important roles played by both institutions, both as a cultural resource and as the permanent repository of government publications and records, the official permanent record of the Government of Canada.

We will continue to strengthen the role as the centre of leadership and expertise on information management within the Government of Canada, dealing with both information used and created by our government institutions. This is a traditional role for both institutions. We will build on it.

The proposed bill continues the legal deposit regime and modernizes it to include, explicitly, online publications, publications put online and publicly available. Legal deposit is a vital tool that supports the long-term preservation and the systematic development of the national collection, and ensures the availability of a country's published heritage. In effect, most modern societies in most modern countries have a legal deposit provision for their national library.

Legal deposit will apply to publications defined in the bill to include any form made available to the public, using any medium, and which would normally be collected by a library, including those distributed online.

Regulations will also continue to be used to refine and detail the application of the legal deposit regime, and the responsibility of who is subject to the regime and who will take action.

For example, the regulations might exclude persons who are only involved in the distribution of publications, while focusing directly on the publishers responsible for the development of the publication. Internet service providers are one example

¿ (0930)

[Translation]

Mr. Roch Carrier: My colleague shared with you some of his preferences from among the millions of existing items. Let me tell you something about the Halifax Gazette. If you visit the schools in that region today, you will see that the students know that the first Canadian newspaper was published in Halifax. This is a precious item.

In the same vein, the ballad of Martin Parker is also very valuable. If I remember correctly, this is a unique item in the world, it is a copy of a poem written in the 1626. It tells of the victory of the British troops when they attacked Quebec. This is a piece of great interest because it gives a full picture of Europe. Moreover, we have writers' manuscripts; sometimes we find a unique copy of a poem written by some inspired poet.

All these treasures are there, but no one will be able to access them if they are not adequately preserved. It is crucial to preserve our documentary heritage well, on adequate premises with all the necessary technology. This is a great challenge, greater than my own small self and certainly greater than our organization. Thus, we must show a national will to preserve our collective memory.

On the practical side, for the past few years we have worked together with Public Works to produce and implement a long-term plan for our facilities. Long-term planning is our challenge. Short-term solutions will not work. So this is a large and ambitious project.

As I said, conservation does not only involve facilities, like roofs and walls for instance. Documents must be machine-readable, and this needs a technological infrastructure with expertise to ensure that we can truly conserve them in a reliable way so that they are not only legible but also reliable a century and more from now.

Further, in order to consolidate the role of the Library and Archives of Canada with regard to conservation, the bill proposes that it should henceforth be possible to request the transfer of documents of a historical or archival value which, in the opinion of the librarian and the archivist, are severely at risk of damage or destruction for reasons like inadequate storage. We simply want to ensure that the memory of our people be preserved and carried into the future.

Government institutions must intervene by transferring endangered documents or by taking steps for their safekeeping. The easy accessibility which we want to offer to all Canadians needs a highly sophisticated organization and description of documents, including the creating of metadata. Such measures would allow all Canadians to efficiently track down—by whatever method they choose—the full, reliable information they want.

We believe that by combining their skills, librarians and archivists will be able to make this storehouse fully accessible. Supposing, for instance, someone is looking for information about the shipwreck of the Empress of Ireland. Through the collaboration which is now going on in more than 40 committees in the Library and the Archives of Canada, a new partnership is now leading us to highly creative solutions, always with the purpose of improving accessibility.

The Library and Archives of Canada want to provide a user-friendly environment to everyone who wants to explore the Canadian documentary heritage. The public, with its various age groups, interests and origins, can easily access what it is looking for. As our social fabric evolves, our clientele evolves as well.

¿ (0935)

Some of our clients are five years old and others are eighty years old; they come from widely varying backgrounds and environments.

We do not want to work in isolation. The challenge is so great that no one can do this work on his own. They key word here is partnership. Now, the new organization of the Library and Archives of Canada intends to give its partners a leading role. We are setting up partnership programs with the network of libraries and archives from coast to coast. Just last Friday, I travelled to British Columbia to discuss with government representatives how we could improve our partnership.

All in all, the future looks very promising as we work to carry out our promise of giving Canadians easy, fair and real access to Canada's documentary heritage.

[English]

Mr. Ian Wilson: The vision that Roch has outlined is very much part of the preamble to Bill C-36 to preserve the documentary heritage of Canada.

My predecessor, Arthur Doughty, referred to the archives, whereby archives are the most precious of all our national assets. We believe that. We believe that for both the library and the archives. Without proper preservation, we lose. It is a valuable asset, and we have to treat it as such. It is valuable for cultural purposes. It has value for identity. It has value, frankly, for legal purposes as well. Every day our holdings are used on issues affecting the legal position of the Government of Canada.

We are to be a source of enduring knowledge about Canada. We stress the word “enduring”. That is our focus. It is accessible to all, appropriately respecting copyright and privacy, but contributing to the advancement of our knowledge society to facilitate cooperation among communities involved in the promotion and preservation of the documentary heritage.

Both of our institutions have been active in our respective communities. We intend to advance that as quickly as possible and begin discussions to help the two communities work better together, in reflecting the way we are working better together, and be the continuing memory of the institutions of the Government of Canada. That is our role.

We hope and expect, with the synergies we develop, that we'll enable Canadians to know themselves, to know and understand the society we have inherited and on which we build, and to understand the strengths and weaknesses of this society as we deal with the problems of the future.

We hope to build a culture of lifelong learning, because using the library and archives is not a passive process. It is not simply reading something that we put in front of you. It is an active process of exploration and discovery, as you look for your own roots, as you look for your own community, and as you look at things of interest to you.

We want to contribute to the growth of the knowledge society in Canada. We also want to share the Canadian experience worldwide. There are many other countries that want to learn how we have developed a unique society in this country.

We hope as well that visibility and relevancy will foster an appreciation across Canadian society for the value of things that many families, many businesses, and many unions have through records, diaries, letters, family Bibles, photographs, video, and film. We hope they will work with libraries and archives across the country to ensure the preservation of this whole record.

We want to reach out to all Canadians to ensure that Canadian history is not only about the founding races. Canadian history is about all of us, all of our backgrounds, and all of our communities. We continue to grow, as Canada grows, reflecting and understanding this diversity and the interaction of cultures that characterize this society.

We want to have new venues to make our materials available. The Portrait Gallery of Canada, across the street in the former United States embassy, will most certainly be working very closely with the new Canada History Centre.

Digitally, we are creating new places, new spaces, and new services. Virtual Reference Canada and the online Canadian Genealogy Centre are already heavily used by Canadians across the country and outside the country. We have developed the virtual gramophone. We have developed Images Canada, reaching Canadians in the classroom, in the public libraries, and in their homes.

Digital is not sufficient. The original works also have to be seen. We will certainly build on the existing inter-library loan program to use libraries across the country as outlets to develop the exhibition program. We are already lending many of our unique resources for exhibitions in different parts of the country. Internationally, we will develop that as well.

¿ (0940)

Mr. Chuck Strahl (Fraser Valley, Canadian Alliance): I have a point of order, Mr. Chairman.

I'm not sure, Mr. Chairman, but if we're only going to go until 10 o'clock, we're going to have no time for questions. I'm enjoying the presentation, but we're out of time.

The Chair: I was going to ask the witnesses that as well. As we started ten minutes late, I was thinking that, in fairness to the members, we would carry on until 10:10.

I was wondering, Mr. Carrier, whether you were about to conclude or how long it will take; otherwise, members won't have a chance to ask questions.

Mr. Roch Carrier: I think it will take a maximum of another five minutes.

The Chair: All right.

[Translation]

Mr. Roch Carrier: George Elliott, in one of her novels, said that great earthshaking events, such as earthquakes, have always been foretold in documents, newspapers or books which have not been read.

Libraries are not only a storehouse of the past. They also help to know the present and perhaps even to solve future problems. The Library and Archives of Canada will be a centre of resources and information for the Canadian government which will take charge by assisting all libraries and archives in this land. The notes that we shared with you will be very closely studied by the library community; they need national leadership to promote and support them.

The new structure will certainly enable the new organization to deliver the service more efficiently. As we often said, we are currently striving to improve conservation and fair access for all Canadians.

[English]

Mr. Ian Wilson: On an issue or concern that has been raised about the mandate in the legislation to interpret and present the documentary heritage of Canada, the archives have in effect been interpreting and presenting the documentary heritage for over a hundred years. It simply means to present documents and information in the context of other relevant documents, and in the context of the time Canadians may draw their own meaning from. Every day, we have in our reading rooms researchers dealing with residential schools issues, land claims issues, and boundary issues. We are the neutral holder of the record, and those with very different and opposing points of view use the record in our reading rooms.

In terms of controversial issues, when Canadians of Japanese origin asked what happened during World War II, and came to the archives in the seventies and eighties, the records were already there. Chinese Canadians who were concerned about the head tax imposed on their families a hundred years ago also came to the archives. We have the record available, which helps present and interpret Canadian history.

And in terms of political issues, we have several hundred thousand political cartoons in our collection, very few of which show great respect to political leaders, from Macdonald onward. Using them will provide a note of both impartiality and criticism.

We will have the advisory council to reinforce our public programming, or to advise on all aspects of our public programming role. We expect the advisory council to be composed of significant individuals with appropriate expertise, ensuring that as we progress with our public programming role, we present a balanced view of Canada and the different perspectives on the Canadian experience, and reflect the richness and diversity of Canadian voices throughout our public programming.

¿ (0945)

[Translation]

Mr. Roch Carrier: Let me conclude by telling you about our personnel.

We were afraid that the status of the employees might have to change. But this did not happen. The new institution still remains a departmental agency, as is currently the case with the Library and the Archives. As in the past, they are accountable to Parliament, through the Minister for Heritage. Thus, the 1,100 employees have kept their status.

The new organization will hire various specialists skilled in various disciplines; some will be librarians and others archivists. There will be specialists in information technology and specialists on content. There will be no change in status and not only will disciplines be respected, various skills will also be emphasized. In fact, the value of an organization like the Library and Archives of Canada resides in its collection, but without the people entrusted with it, the collection remains inert.

With regard to personnel, let me mention the fact that at the outset, right after I was appointed, someone observed that I was in charge of a very precious collection but that I should not forget that my personnel is also a national treasure. And we still believe this.

[English]

Mr. Ian Wilson: I think, finally, what we're trying to do here—

Mr. Chuck Strahl: How many “finallys” are we going to have?

Mr. Ian Wilson: One minute at most, sir.

I would simply say that we're trying to create a new institution. It's not just an amalgamation of the library and archives, but a transformation into a new kind of knowledge institution for Canada in the 21st century. It's a huge challenge. We require all disciplines; we require our collections. It is a challenge we're trying to take up as we bring these two institutions together.

Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Carrier and Mr. Wilson.

[English]

We'll start right away with questions. We'll have one round of questions each.

Mr. Strahl.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Thank you.

Thank you both for good presentations. We're short of time, so we have to move to questions.

I did find it inspiring, actually, to listen to you both. I was almost prepared to adjourn and go over to have a look at the archives, but maybe we better not.

I hope you have a copy of Eugène Bellemare's book of political cartoons of every member of Parliament. I ripped out the page with me on it, but the rest of it looked pretty good.

I have a couple of questions that I asked when we had other officials here earlier. One is that you used an awful lot of words saying that you hope, you expect, you wish for, you think that there may be improvements, you hope to be able to contribute to things, or you hope that synergies will be created, and so on. Yet when I asked the other day for an overall plan of how the organization or the new institution this legislation builds fits in with the proposal for a new building, an organizational chart, and a timeline.... A lot of money is going to be spent and a lot of effort going to be expended, and now we're talking about the legislative effort to create something, yet it seems like there are parts of it that are still so up in the air that we're not sure how they are going to fit in.

We're being asked to look at this legislation and to approve it. You don't have to sell us on the value of the archives or the library, but you have to sell us on how this is going to fit into the grand plan. Without that plan, it's hard to be enthusiastic. We tend to want to support this legislation. It's likely going to pass, but there is some concern, and we see some of it in the newspapers, that perhaps the plan is not well enough fleshed out, and therefore that we're building a part of this thing while the other parts are either not coming along, not getting cooperation, or are not being priced out. That's disturbing to me. I still haven't heard if that plan is actually available to look at.

Can you respond to that?

¿ (0950)

Mr. Roch Carrier: We will answer in collaboration, as we do many things together.

At the end of June we'll be able to have a more precise answer. We started that process a year ago.

The project was mentioned in the Speech from the Throne last fall, and we are now, as much as possible, acting as one organization, even if, let's say, we are two. It's a big challenge. It's a change in culture. It's a transformation.

Our staff is really involved. I mentioned some minutes ago that we have 42 committees working together, archivists and librarians working together, to design how we will be working in the future. They talk about preservation, acquisition, content...everything.

At this moment we don't have a kind of organizational structure. It's not there yet. We have to define what we'll be doing before jumping to the chart.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: I would just reiterate the difficulty on the legislative side, in that this is part of quite a few things that are happening: you need facilities, you need organization, you're going to have a new command structure, all these things, along with the legislative framework, and just seeing how this plugs in. The only reluctance I have on the legislation is just to pass it not knowing how it fits into the rest of what you're doing.

I find that some cart is ahead of some horse here right now, and it's hard to be enthusiastic about it--I'll just be blunt about it. It may pass through the House, or it may get held up just in the fact that people are unsure of where you're going with this. I think eventually it may pass.

The only other question I have--and I mentioned this the other day in committee as well--is about protecting government information. You have an important role in preserving it. One of the other issues is in protecting it in order to preserve it.

Mr. Reid, the information commissioner, mentioned certainly in newspaper reports recently that he has concerns that sometimes it doesn't get to you. It gets destroyed before it gets to you, or people don't bother preserving it, or they take it upon themselves to decide what's important and not, instead of handing it to archivists and librarians who are experts in the subject.

Is one of these committees working on actively instructing, teaching, or helping government departments to preserve archival information properly? Do they wait until there's a crisis in the newspaper or a crisis of confidence somewhere, or is there an actual program where you're trying to change the culture of departmental work to preserve information for the archivists?

Mr. Ian Wilson: We are in fact very actively engaged with the chief information officer's branch, Treasury Board Secretariat, with a program across the government to assist all departments and government agencies with information management requirements.

A few weeks ago Treasury Board approved a new management of government information policy that defines roles and responsibilities for deputy ministers and deputy heads, for Treasury Board Secretariat, for the library and archives, in assisting and supporting departments. This is seen as a very high priority across the public service. It is an issue of culture, an issue of understanding, but we are making it very clear. We are making our requirements and expectations with respect to the archival record clear right across the system, and we're getting very good support from the senior levels of the public service.

¿ (0955)

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The Chair: Madame Girard-Bujold.

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold (Jonquière): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Gentlemen, I listened to you with great interest. From your presentations, I gathered that you are currently members of two very different organizations, but that you are working together in an ongoing way in many fields. I also noticed that you are proactive. You say that we must look toward the future and you are already putting this into practice as you carry out your mandates.

What will this bill add to what you already have? My colleague, who has an interest in this file, says that currently libraries, and especially the Association pour l'avancement des sciences et des techniques de la documentation are still rather lukewarm about merging these two organizations. You have distinct mandates, but they are complementary.

Since we represent the opposition, we the members of the Bloc Québécois are opposed to this bill in principle. We think that it should be divided into two parts because the part about royalties is very important. Currently, you are functioning as two entities, and we think that this is quite normal. You are active, you are proactive, you already have a vision. I do not see any reason why you need a bill for continuing to make progress.

Could you tell me what advantage you will get from this bill?

Mr. Roch Carrier: The new collaboration you mentioned is, I think, a great advantage for all Canadians. It has already allowed us to create a number of products, like the Genealogy Centre, for example. We pulled together our resources in personnel and collections, in order to create the centre. On a more everyday level, we produced a file on the history of hockey, by pooling both our collections.

The current cooperation is, I think, due to two personalities brought together by circumstances. Before taking up our respective positions, we got in touch by telephone and we said that although we did not know each other, we would be spending a few years together, and so it was up to us to decide whether we would work together or fight each other. I am a pretty good fighter. I think that Ian also knows what fighting is about. So, from the outset, we decided to work together. This depends on personalities, and things might be different if Mr. Wilson were not there or if I were not there.

The bill will enshrine this collaboration.

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: I see that the advisory committee will be appointed by the Minister of Heritage, but I do not know what this committee's criteria are for nominations. Do you think that this committee should be appointed independently, that it should not be appointed by the minister, that it should be done as it is now being done in Quebec, with the Advisory Committee of the Bibliothèque nationale du Québec? Do you think that the bill should define the qualifications of the members of this committee? The issue of the advisory committee is not clear. Do you have a vision of what it should be, which might reassure many people who would otherwise be reluctant to adopt this bill?

Do you think that this committee will be independent in its consultations? You said that the bill has a framework for consultation. Will this be of any advantage to this new entity, or will we simply further politicize what we have already? Or on the other hand, would your organizations become less political?

À (1000)

Mr. Roch Carrier: Personally, I was appointed by the minister, and she gave me the mandate to make the National Library visible to all Canadians. This is the only directive I had and when I took charge, I immediately agreed to follow the tradition of the Archives and the tradition of the Library; it requires some objectivity, which means that issues must be dealt with within their full context.

For instance, we are currently holding an exhibition on the American borders. We have various aspects of the context available because this is how we organize our exhibits and other activities. I am very glad that the bill has provided for an advisory committee. I suppose that this committee will be made up of a number of professionals or other persons who contribute their time to the institution.

Right now I have no reason to fear, none at all, because as an intellectual, I greatly value not only freedom of expression, but also freedom of opinion, and I do not see this mentioned here. Within our current discussions, I do not see any will, at this time, to turn these institutions into propaganda machines.

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Excuse me, sir, but I have already seen advisory committees which did not change anything for the better, only for the worse. I think that currently, you have two well-defined positions in the Archives and the Library. In my opinion, an archivist and a librarian may be complementary, but their roles are very different.

I would like the bill to mention that the members of the advisory committee should be independent from the minister. I think that this would help you to work more freely. You said that since you have been in these positions, both of you have enjoyed great freedom and you both have a vision. There must be guidelines for the future. You know that if we want to set guidelines, there must not be obstacles in the present. Thus, we can make future progress.

Mr. Roch Carrier: Our activities are very much client-oriented. You know that currently, in schools, young students are not worried about how their information is delivered. Be it by paper or by electronic means, it does not matter to them, information is information. They want to get their information or knowledge quickly.

Right now, many walls are being torn down by this new technological civilization, and we must serve this new clientele, which is the clientele of the future.

[English]

The Chair: What I would suggest in the time left--there's barely ten minutes--if the government side agrees, is one question from the Liberals and one from Ms. Lill, and then we'll close this session. Is that fair enough? There's very little time left.

Are there any questions from the Liberal side?

Ms. Bulte.

Ms. Sarmite Bulte (Parkdale—High Park, Lib.): Thank you very much for your presentation and for so eloquently putting forward the purpose of the new archives and the library.

I have a question from a copyright point of view. Perhaps you're not the people I should be speaking to, but I'm concerned about the sampling from the Internet that is introduced here. I understand that the Copyright Act is also being amended on this, but how do you explain the sampling to me?

When I see sampling from the Internet, it reminds me of downloading. We tell our children and adults they shouldn't be taking things off the Internet because it's a breach of copyright, yet here we're allowing sampling. Perhaps you can tell me what your understanding of sampling is and how it isn't downloading, and how we just legitimize it by saying it's okay for you to do it, but not anybody else.

À (1005)

Mr. Ian Wilson: I think the issue is whether we need to keep a record of what has been on the Internet. We have been collecting newspapers for years. They're automatically collected, gathered, preserved, and maintained. We've been collecting publications for years, centuries.

Internet is the new communications form, the new communications media. I think, as many other countries are doing, we need to find the way to preserve a record so that a hundred years from now Canadians can understand the impact of this new communications technology, its impact on society, what was being said.

We're clearly limiting anything we would do to sample Internet sites that are available publicly without any restriction--that is, they're just put out there for the public to use, the public to see, the public to deal with. We would have to devise a periodic approach, perhaps on a statistical basis, to try to work out when to sample, how frequently.

There are also some interesting technology issues as to how we are actually going to preserve that for the very long term. We've recently preserved one website from the millennium. We have, I think, a wish to try to preserve the government's own website, which changes almost daily right now. But how do we capture that for the long term as a record of what government has told Canadians? Then we broaden it to look at what is publicly available without restriction on the Internet and pull that in for the purpose of preservation.

Ms. Sarmite Bulte: What about music? Are you able to download music as well?

I have a real concern here, because at the same time I'm hearing the creators in SOCAN and BMG Canada saying that business is really bad, so please stop downloading from the Internet. Again, it's not just 14-year-olds that are doing it; adults are doing it, and it's stealing.

How do we on one hand say it's stealing and we need to protect the rights of our creators, and at the same time allow sampling, which I would respectively submit is not defined properly? There's no definition. It's all subject to interpretation. You could almost end up downloading music and justifying it because of the public good.

Mr. Ian Wilson: I think the point is we're sampling it from the point of view of preservation. We're not going to put it back online. We're not going to make it more broadly accessible until the very long term, when most rights have expired. Ultimately, this would be available 50 years or 100 years in the future simply as a reflection of Canadian communication media, what Canadians were doing.

We already have agreements with many broadcasters to sample a day on air. We've asked broadcasters to record a typical day on radio or television, just to give us a sense of what Canadians are listening to, and capture it. But again, the point is, it's for preservation, not for reuse.

Ms. Sarmite Bulte: Mr. Wilson, you did say you have agreement with the broadcasters. Do you have agreements with SOCAN and the other rights holders as well?

Mr. Ian Wilson: In terms of...?

Ms. Sarmite Bulte: For this sampling.

Mr. Ian Wilson: No. The legislation would deal with the copyright issues to enable us to do this for preservation purposes, not for continuing access.

Ms. Sarmite Bulte: Then why do you have an agreement with the broadcasters?

Mr. Ian Wilson: For the broadcast materials, we need their cooperation in order to capture that recording, a 24-hour sample of a broadcast on a radio station. We have to ask them to help us do it.

Ms. Sarmite Bulte: I understand.

Then why wouldn't you need the consent of SOCAN and the other rights holders with respect to music? You're saying now documentary heritage can be many things, multimedia.

The Chair: Ms. Bulte, I suggest that when the copyright representatives come before the committee we then deal with this question, if needed. This is what our role is: to look at the legislation and see where we should intervene.

Ms. Sarmite Bulte: I understand that what we're trying to do is preserve, but I'm also very concerned about how this is going to affect the rights holders, especially if music is captured within this as well.

The Chair: I understand. Thanks for bringing it up.

Ms. Lill.

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP): Thank you very much for coming, and I apologize for being late.

I have been following this bill closely, and I just have one question. I think it's one that's near and dear to both your hearts, and that is how can we make sure that we protect the collections and that it be the first priority, that we protect the archival material, that we protect the books?

In this Q & A we have received it talks about the fact that the transitional costs will be $7.5 million and there will be basically no cuts to...it doesn't say no cuts to staff, it says there will be no changes to the status of the staff. But I think we have to be sure there are going to be enough curators and people to care for the very precious material that we have here.

I had a conversation recently around the issue of the Canadian Archival Information Network, the CAIN project, and people in Nova Scotia are very concerned that they've seen cuts to that. It's all about getting Canadian content on the Internet. Those are the nation's documents--getting them on the Internet. So how does this committee know and keep informed that there's no slippage, that there's not material being lost, or that your concerns on this issue are being met? I'd like to know what kinds of safeguards are in place and if we can be of any assistance to make sure that we can give you backup on that.

À (1010)

Mr. Ian Wilson: There are a couple of points. I think we've been very clear with our staff that this process is not about reducing the number of staff. We are, as part of our transformation plan, engaging all staff in discussion. How do we do things differently? How do we take professional principle and ensure that's respected for both librarians and archivists and carry it forward? So we are engaging all staff in that process, and there will be changes, but we don't expect to be removing staff from the organization. That continues.

In terms of preservation, I think part of the announcement was there would be some money provided for an interim storage solution to solve the most immediate storage problems, in terms of material that's in basements or inappropriate warehouses. That is being addressed immediately, and we're working closely with Public Works on this to make it happen right now.

And in terms of other issues, on long-term budgeting we are looking very actively with our staff at everything we're doing, to see where we can shift resources and economize in some areas, to shift to priority areas to ensure that we are preserving the collections properly. That's top priority, very clearly, but it is a continuing process of looking at how the resources are allocated within the library and archives.

Mr. Roch Carrier: I'd like to add one or two comments on that.

I think we made a number of efforts to promote the idea of preservation, but in the whole context it was not terribly sexy to talk about our old papers that we want to protect, and sometimes they are not very well protected. Sometimes there are plumbing problems and all that. It was not terribly sexy until what happened in Iraq, and I think a lot of people suddenly woke up to the idea that if you lose your library, or part of the library, not only do you lose something but the whole world loses something in the experience of this specific people.

So there is much more understanding, but there is much more work to do to educate, and I say that with great respect, because I would not accuse anybody of not understanding what preservation is about. It's a difficult thing and it's very subtle and complex. But the new institution will be, and already is, dedicated to preservation because preservation is the key. If there is no preservation there is no access. And we have at the moment committees from both organizations working together on how we can work better in the future. We are talking with Public Works constantly, with Treasury Board constantly.

As I said before, it's a huge challenge, and it takes a lot of time, but we are moving.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Monsieur Carrier and Mr. Wilson. I hope many Canadians heard you this morning, because I think they have been sensitized to the great importance of both your institutions. We congratulate you for trying to bring them together, and we appreciate your presence here. I hope we can carry on with our work now and perhaps finish it before the break in June. So we appreciate your presence. Thank you for coming.

At this time, the meeting will be conducted in camera. We have to devote half an hour to future business, which is important to complete. If the next witnesses would maybe reconvene here about quarter to eleven, we'll make sure you get your full time afterwards. Thank you.

The meeting is suspended.

[Proceedings continue in camera]

Á (1100)

[Translation]

[Public hearing resumes]

The Chair: We are now resuming the committee meeting on Bill C-36, an act to establish the Library and Archives of Canada, to amend the Copyright Act and to amend certain acts in consequence.

We have some witnesses before us. We will be hearing Mr. Howard Knopf, a copyright lawyer, make an individual presentation.

[English]

and from the Creators Copyright Coalition, Marion Hebb, legal counsel.

[Translation]

From Droit d'auteur / Multimédia-Internet / Copyright (DAMIC), we welcome Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne, Director General, Société professionnelle des auteurs et compositeurs du Québec, and Mr. Michel Beauchemin, Coordinator.

[English]

From Public History Inc. we have Fred Hosking, president, and Mr. Stuart Manson, vice-president; and from the Writers' Union of Canada, Ms. Janet Lunn, the past chair.

To allow enough time for questioning, I would like the witnesses to speak very briefly each so that everybody has a chance to speak. We'll have one person speaking for DAMIC, one person for Public History. I will start with DAMIC, Mr. Beauchemin.

Á (1105)

[Translation]

Mr. Michel Beauchemin (Coordinator, Droit d'auteur / Multimédia-Internet / Copyright (DAMIC)): Thank you for having us here today.

Our two organizations will be making a joint presentation. DAMIC is the Droit d'auteur / Multimédia-Internet / Copyright, and represents 11 Quebec associations and companies involved in collective copyright management. There is also the CCC, the Creators' Copyright Coalition, comprised of 17 artists' associations and collective copyright management companies in English Canada.

This morning we can say that we represent nearly 140,000 artists and copyright holders in Canada.

Let me introduce Ms. Bertrand-Venne, who is a member of the DAMIC. She is the Director General of the Société professionnelle des auteurs-compositeurs. There is also Ms. Marian Hebb, representing the CCC on behalf of English Canada. I will testify in French, but Ms. Hebb will testify in English.

I must state at the outset that we are appearing here this morning not because we have an opinion about the merger of the Archives and the National Library as such. We are not against it, but we have not collectively taken up a position regarding this issue. Nonetheless, we are aware of the fact that this bill refers to an issue which is very important for us, namely, the protection of unpublished works whose copyright is to be extended. This aspect of the bill is of specific interest to us.

Having said that, let me add that when we became aware of this bill, about two weeks ago, we were dismayed to see that this bill includes amendments to the Copyright Act. This act, as you know, deals with the main source of income of the 140,000 artists we represent.

Why were we dismayed? Because the mandate of the newly created institution not only includes collecting and preserving our heritage, but it also includes displaying this heritage to Canadians and to any interested person in Canada. You understand that when we saw that subsection 8(2) and the following text gives the new entity the possibility of recording or, at least, downloading copyright-protected works from Internet, we were seriously concerned by the fact that the mandate no longer only dealt with conservation but also with the public display of this heritage. This was really a serious concern for us, especially as it gives the Archives the right to download information.

As you know, there are currently many works illegally online. Thus, by downloading excerpts or images from sites, sooner or later, the Archives might end up downloading works that are illegally online. This is why we took an interest in this issue and examined the matter of whether we are for or against these two amendments.

I must mention that we held many consultations with the copyright branch of Heritage Canada. The things we were told allayed some of our concerns. We were told that in fact, the bill is only meant to preserve things and not to put works online or to disseminate them widely.

That being said, as you know, next fall you will have to announce your decision—and you will no doubt have the pleasure of seeing us again—regarding the report on the implementation of the Copyright Act, prepared pursuant to section 92 of the Copyright Act. As you know, this first round or this upcoming round of the Copyright Act review will really involve the entire issue of the preservation and use of copyright-protected works on the Internet. We cannot ignore the fact that in this context, we were concerned when we saw this new exception in the bill. We would prefer the debate on this question to be held next fall, when the entire issue will be brought forward for study.

Ideally, our position would be that, as a first step, we should probably consider withdrawing subsection 8(2) from the bill. Having said that, we do not want to intrude into the legislative process. This morning, the point we want to make is that we are very concerned with the exceptions. We know, for instance, that in the field of education, many people claim the right to use at no cost any work made available to the public without any restriction, following the provisions of the bill. These are the concerns we bring before you.

This morning, we can propose two options to defend the rights of creative workers or copyright holders.

Á (1110)

Let me now give the floor to Ms. Marian Hebb, who prepared a document. Unfortunately, it is only available in English. With the time we had, we could only prepare it in English. She will make the presentation and I will translate the main points when they come up.

[English]

Ms. Marian Hebb (Legal Counsel, Creators Copyright Coalition): We have two alternatives to suggest. We have one that is very much our preference, and which we would like to put forward as a way of fixing this bill to address the problems that my colleague has mentioned.

Our first suggestion is that the entire subclause 8(2) of Bill 36 should be deleted. This subclause is the one that of course permits the new Library and Archives of Canada to take a representative sample of documentary material of interest to Canada that is accessible to the public without restriction from the Internet or other media for the purpose of preservation. That subclause would disappear.

This would also mean making a change to clause 26, which amends section 30.5 of the Copyright Act. We propose deleting paragraph 30.5(a) of the Copyright Act, again in its entirety. This is the section that permits the library and archives to make a copy of a work or other subject matter when it takes this representative sample of material from the Internet, as described in the other subclause, in 8(2).

So we would like this issue involving a new exception in the Copyright Act to be dealt with along with other digital issues in the copyright revision process, which is already under way as part of the general discussion about digital issues. That to us would be the best solution to the problem.

We do, however, have a further suggestion as an alternative, if that first suggestion does not attract you. That would mean going to subclause 8(2), which now has a phrase in it about taking, for the purpose of preservation, a representative sample of documentary material of interest to Canada that is accessible to the public without restriction through the Internet. We would suggest that this phrase be amended to read “documentary material of interest to Canada that is accessible to the public with the consent of the copyright owner”. That would address our problems to a large extent. “Without restriction” is ambiguous. It's unclear what it means, whether it means there are no technical protection measures on it or what exactly it means. But I think what we all are concerned about is that if the material is on the Internet we should know that it is there with the consent of the copyright owner and with the intention of the copyright owner to have it copied.

Along with that suggestion we would also propose that in clause 26, which amends section 30.5 of the Copyright Act, which creates the exception to allow the National Library and National Archives to do this without infringing copyright, we would like to see added to that clause the phrase “for preservation purposes only”. So that would read that it is not an infringement of copyright for the purposes of the Library and Archives of Canada Act, for preservation purposes only, to take the material from the Internet. Or it could be said more succinctly that it's not an infringement of copyright for the purpose of preservation under the Library and Archives of Canada Act.

You might say, and it has been said, that this is in fact redundant, that it is repeating what is already in subclause 8(2), but in fact the addition of those words to the Copyright Act itself is extremely significant. Inserting this language into the Copyright Act will highlight this restriction and it will allay the concerns of creators. It will ensure that the Library and Archives of Canada Act will not be amended later to permit dissemination of material that the archivists have captured from the websites without a simultaneous amendment of the Copyright Act.

Inevitably there will be pressure down the road to make the materials that are available at the new institution in Ottawa also available to scholars and researchers in other parts of the country without travelling to Ottawa. Creators are extremely concerned about the risks arising from digital dissemination of their works and other subject matter. Both their economic rights and their moral rights are at stake. In most instances, of course, creators want to have further reproduction and communication of their copyright materials, but they do wish to be absolutely sure that the material does not escape from their control, that their name is not perhaps misused or omitted, or the material altered in an unacceptable way. And they do not wish to lose their ability to disseminate their material for their own economic benefit.

Á (1115)

If the purpose of preservation is mentioned in the new exception to the Copyright Act for the Library and Archives of Canada, it will not be possible to have creators' materials used for any purpose other than preservation simply by an amendment to the Library and Archives Act. It would then be necessary also to amend the Copyright Act.

[Translation]

Mr. Michel Beauchemin: I have only one thing to add; let me tell you why the term “unrestricted” in this bill is alarming for us.

As you might know, the Council of Ministers of Education of Canada now wants an exception, it wants an unrestricted right to freely use any work made available to the public on the Internet. By “unrestricted” they understand that the note “copyrighted work, no copying” would not be enough for them. For a work to be “unrestricted”, it would have to be encrypted or strongly protected in order to intentionally make it inaccessible to potential users.

This is the reason why we felt so alarmed when we found these terms in the bill. We know that currently, accepting these terms implies that once anything is on the Internet, with or without a statement that this work is copyrighted, people will feel that they can use it without any further ado and, of course, for free. For these reasons, this issue is of serious concern to us, and we propose an amendment that really restricts the scope of these terms.

[English]

The Chair: Madam Bertrand-Venne.

[Translation]

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne (Director General, Société professionnelle des auteurs et des compositeurs du Québec, Droit d'auteur / Multimédia-Internet / Copyright (DAMIC)): Let me add that I am also here to represent the music industry. I must emphasize that this goes beyond literary work. Of course, this concerns copyright as a whole. Copyright holders for all the works protected by the Copyright Act are affected by this bill. Section 8 deals with shows. There are many elements affecting many sectors. This is the point I want you to understand. This is why we came here with our colleagues who are more involved with literature. But we all are concerned about the copyright issue.

Mr. Michel Beauchemin was quite right in what he said about the term “unrestricted”. You surely know that in many sectors there are collective management companies, but there are also many creative workers who manage their copyrights themselves and who may not be members of collectives. This consequently leads to many problems.

If I set up a website which says that you cannot copy my work, and if institutions believe that they can use it despite the ban, we absolutely must safeguard our rights. We can never tell you too much about our concerns due to the accessibility made possible by the new technology, and we hope we will be able to present you with a whole picture and a more coherent one when the Copyright Act will be reviewed. This is why we came here this morning, in order to ensure that there be strong safeguards in this bill for our work, although we are not opposed to the bill as such.

Á (1120)

[English]

The Chair: Mrs. Lunn.

Ms. Janet Lunn (Past Chair, Writers' Union of Canada): I would like to thank you for hearing us today on a matter that's of great importance to Canadian writers.

A writer's legacy to his or her family is the copyright in the works created during his or her lifetime. Often a writer is able to leave little else. We don't as writers have large estates and stocks and bonds usually. Our works are our legacy.

By shortening the period of protection for works still unpublished at the time of an author's death, the 1997 amendments to the Copyright Act reduced the value of this legacy for all writers who died before the end of December in 1949. Under the Copyright Act, prior to the 1997 amendments, when a writer died his or her unpublished works remained protected as long as they were unpublished, and for 50 years after publication. The 1997 amendments changed that law. Now copyright in the living author's unpublished material expires 50 years after his or her death, at the same time as copyright expires in that author's published works.

Since the amendments came into force, copyright for the unpublished works of authors who died between 1949 and 1998 will be protected until 2048, but the unpublished work of authors who died before 1949 is now protected only until the end of this year. In other words, their works not published by the end of 1998, even if they have been published since, will come into the public domain on January 1, 2004. This means that while an author who died on January 1, 1949, is protected until 2048, an author who died one day earlier, on December 31, 1948, is protected only until January 1, 2004.

In 1997 the heirs of authors who died before 1949 were given only five years to publish those authors' unpublished works. And even were they able to find a publisher within that time, the published book would not be protected after the end of this year. It is very unlikely that those authors' heirs could find someone willing to risk publishing a book that would have little or no copyright protection.

In many countries, including the United States and the countries of the European Union, copyright protection now continues for 70 years after an author's death. The current provision in Canada will make it quite likely that an author's heirs affected by this provision will look for a publisher outside Canada with a 70-year copyright protection. It would certainly be prudent for them to try to do so for those extra 20 years of protection, which they would have, not only in the country where the work or works are published, but in all countries where the 70-year protection is in force. I think the loss to Canadian publishers of this potentially valuable work would be considerable, and to our Canadian culture in general.

We in the Writer's Union of Canada believe that this treatment of the work of these authors who died more than 50 years before the 1997 amendments is arbitrary and unfair. For this reason, we got together with members of associations that involve librarians, archivists, and historians to look for consensus on a more reasonable transitional provision.

I am pleased to report to you that we did reach a consensus about this and about certain record-keeping with respect to the copying of unpublished material held in archives. I have to say that this makes me personally very happy, because I write history and historical novels for children and young people, and access to archival material is really important to me. I also teach the writing of family stories to old people, and I encourage them all to use archives and also to contribute to archives. So I find this a very personal issue.

My colleague, Marian Hebb, who is counsel to the Writer's Union of Canada, will report to you on the consultation we had.

Á (1125)

The Chair: Mrs. Hebb, briefly please.

Ms. Marian Hebb: Before I tell you about the consultation, I'd just like to say that Janet is a two-time winner of the Governor General's award for children's literature and a member of the Order of Canada.

In September 1997, several months following the passage of the amendments to the Copyright Act, a meeting was organized by government that brought together representatives of archivists and writers and government officials involved in copyright revision. Section 7 was discussed. Willingness was expressed to discuss possible solutions to the unfairness the revisions had created. On December 31, 1998, the revised section came into force. The five-year countdown mentioned by Janet Lunn began.

In February 1999 the government produced a discussion paper setting out options for a more reasonable transition from the perpetual copyright in unpublished works that had existed prior to the 1997 amendment. Officials from the two government departments, industry and heritage, indicated that if there were to be a general consensus among interested parties and an alternative to the provision enacted in 1997, they would recommend such amendments to their respective ministers. As well as options for section 7, the government discussion paper included a component on record keeping in section 32.2 of the Copyright Act. The 1999 discussion paper went to the Writers' Union of Canada, the National Archives of Canada, the Canadian Historical Association, and an archivist who had been active on behalf of archivists in the copyright revision process.

In the fall of 2001, Wanda Noel, a lawyer who is involved in the library community and has advised this committee, was engaged by the government to act as a facilitator for our consultation group. We were invited to meet and discuss options for section 7. The group consisted of a university archivist from the Bureau of Canadian Archivists, a representative of the Canadian Historical Association, an archivist from the National Archives of Canada, who is here today, and the executive director of the Writers' Union and myself. Wanda Noel wrote a discussion paper that was the basis for the discussions and chaired the meetings. The first meeting was held in January 2002.

The participants agreed to consult their communities prior to the next meeting, which was held at the end of February 2002. A consensus was reached at this February meeting, both on an amendment to section 7 and on an amendment to the record-keeping provision in section 30.2 of the Copyright Act. The writers agreed to dispense with the record-keeping requirement that archivists found onerous of keeping records of copies made of unpublished works of authors who could not be located and keeping them available for public inspection.

Subsequent to this last meeting a final paper including the agreed proposal was written by Wanda Noel and the participants, and the consultation confirmed that the final proposal had the support of their communities. Clauses 21 and 22 of Bill C-36 reflect the consensus that was reached, and we support this.

Thank you very much.

The Chair: Mr. Hosking or Mr. Manson.

Mr. Fred Hosking (President, Public History Inc.): Thank you for allowing me to speak to you today.

My name is Fred Hosking, and I am the president of Public History Inc. Our firm was founded in 1996, and today we are the largest private sector historical research firm in Canada. We currently have a full-time staff of 70, and on a yearly basis we spend over 25,000 hours conducting research at the National Archives of Canada and the National Library. For this reason, I feel that we are well qualified to present to you today.

I won't be talking about any of the copyright issues. I'll be leaving that to my colleagues here. What I would like to talk about is because our research firm spends so much time in the National Archives.... We are essentially not an advocacy firm, but a firm of researchers, and we spend the bulk of our time in the National Archives conducting research on a variety of issues, whether it's aboriginal land claim issues, institutional abuse issues, dealing with trade litigation, or health product liability litigation. We spend our time in the National Archives doing the research. We are the ones finding the documents to provide to our clients. We deal with a number of clients, including the federal government, provincial governments, first nations, law firms, and corporations. We are the ones doing the digging to present this material to our clients. In most cases the research we do, while not directly for the purposes of litigation, ultimately has the option to go to litigation at some point in time.

Let me begin by saying that we support Bill C-36. We see a number of benefits arising from the bill, not the least of which will be the pooling of strategic resources and the ability to work together toward complementary goals and objectives. We see this as being especially true in the area of web development, in the accessibility of information online, especially digitization of historical documents online. We believe that the time has come for one institution to be the keeper of Canada's documentary heritage instead of two. This being said, we recognize that this act is merely a framework agreement in which the specifics of the merger will occur over the next several years, and we do have several concerns coming out of this.

Our first concern is one of how the amalgamation will occur. Given that this is a framework agreement, we have a number of concerns. Given the historical development of the National Archives and the National Library—both have developed very different cultures, very different methodologies, and in many ways, even though they are in the same building, the two institutions have for many years been very separate—our concern is that the transition of the amalgamation, if not done with foresight and a lot of direction, will cause chaos for the end user, the researchers who use this institution. And undoing any of the mistakes that are done over the next couple of years will be very expensive and time-consuming.

Our second concern deals with funding. Given that we are using the National Archives on an ongoing basis, and have been doing so since 1986, we have seen an extensive increase in the use of the National Archives. I'm not speaking just of professional researchers but of genealogists, of academics, of students, and just Canadians interested in finding out more about their history. At the same time, while the National Archives has made significant strides in improving services to the client and to the end user such as ourselves, the demand for services is outstripping the capability of the National Archives to keep up. This is being reflected most clearly in areas such as access to information and privacy requests through the National Archives, accessibility of material, increasing inaccessibility of archivists, difficulty with older, antiquated material, and also dealing with the National Archives records, which are kept at federal record centres across the country.

Our concern is that even without the merger that is coming as a result of BIll C-36, we see the demand on the National Archives and National Library significantly increasing.

Our company has done a number of internal studies, and we estimate that the business of historical research ranges between $75 million and $100 million every year. The bulk of this work is actually done at the National Archives and at the National Library. Given the increase in demand for people to do research on genealogy, the increasing amount of research people are doing online, and most importantly the increase in litigation involving the federal government, we see that even without this amalgamation the demand on the National Archives and National Library will explode over the next several years. Our biggest concern is that the funding won't be in place now and in the future to ensure that the services are there, not just to preserve the documents, but to make them available and readily accessible to all Canadians.

I don't know how many of you have done research at the archives in Washington. We do a fair bit of research there, and you can tell that this is a world-class institution. They put a lot of effort, a lot of thought, and a lot of foresight into building their institution, and the services they provide to their clients are second to none. It's our hope that with this amalgamation, with this pooling of resources, with this pooling of expertise in one institution, we'll be able to build an institution that will surpass what the Americans have been able to do in Washington with their archives.

Á (1130)

We've done a lot of work with the archives over the last number of years, and we know they've made a number of great strides. Certainly the archives is more accessible today in terms of raising researcher concerns and researcher issues than they have ever been before, but our biggest concern is that there is an explosion and there will continue to be unprecedented growth in the demand for this information. Whether it's professional, such as ourselves, or whether it's genealogy, academics, or students, the demand is only going to increase.

With this amalgamation occurring, we want to raise our concern that the funding be there not only now, which we have seen, but also down the road to ensure that the archives and the National Library, as a new institution, will not only be able to keep up with the current and future demand, but also have the resources to dedicate to such projects as Ian Wilson and Roch Carrier spoke about this morning, whether it's the Mackenzie King papers online, which were released last week, which are an invaluable research tool, or whether it's issues dealing with web information, genealogical information, and the availability and accessibility of this information across the Internet.

Again, the profile of the National Archives and National Library has increased in the last several years. They're in the paper more. They're accessible to schools. Their outreach programs have improved dramatically. And of course there's one institution instead of two. This is only going to increase.

More and more Canadians are finding history interesting. We do a lot of public speaking to students and we do public speaking to historical societies, and we see ourselves that the interest and the desire of Canadians to learn more about themselves, to learn more about their history, and to learn more about their heritage is growing. We find that very encouraging as Canadians, but at the same time, these are the people who are going to be using the National Archives and the National Library. And once it becomes a single institution, again, they will only be using it more.

We know the National Archives doesn't currently have the funding it needs to meet demand, and we don't want to see, down the road, this new institution in a position where it needs to go cap in hand because other museums that are obviously on the agenda take precedence. We don't want to see the National Archives in a position where it needs to go cap in hand to the private sector to say they need to make up shortfalls to buy equipment, or they need to make up shortfalls to hire specialized staff, to hire archivists.

On a personal note, we'd like to see nothing more than the new institution called the “Public History Institute of Knowledge,” but we recognize the importance of separating the archives and library of Canada from the public sector and ensuring it has the funding it needs to be able to develop our history and our heritage for all Canadians to have quick and easy access.

We recognize that it isn't going to be cheap, and the question we need to put forth is what cost is too much for Canadians to have quick and easy access to their history and heritage?

We'd like to commend you for the bill. We see it as a step in the right direction. Our concerns deal primarily with funding and the fact that this transition be done professionally, that it be done with vision, with foresight, to reduce any possibility of problems or chaos down the road with an amalgamation that isn't done properly and would cost a lot of money essentially to redo what's not done right the first time.

Thank you very much.

Á (1135)

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Hosking.

Finally, Mr. Knopf.

Mr. Howard Knopf (Copyright Lawyer, As Individual): Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee.

I'm speaking today on my own behalf as a copyright lawyer, and on behalf of Professor Jack Granatstein, a distinguished Canadian historian and former director and CEO of the Canadian War Museum. He has contributed to the remarks I'm about to make and agrees with them. He regrets that his previous commitments at the Royal Military College prevent him from being here.

His views are important not only because of his accomplishments, but because of his prolific, authoritative, and pre-eminent work on Canada's military and political history covering the very period that would be most affected by this bill.

The honourable Minister of Canadian Heritage has introduced Bill C-36, which is mainly about amalgamating the National Archives and the National Library, but it also contains some frankly problematical amendments to the Copyright Act that are completely unnecessary to the overall purpose of the bill.

Lucy Maud Montgomery died in 1942. She is deservedly a Canadian icon. Her heirs appear to be the driving force behind the copyright provisions in this bill that would extend the term of copyright in certain posthumous works. Her estate's copyright on her published works ran out, of course, in 1992, 50 years after her death. Nonetheless, through other intellectual property means using the Trademarks Act, the Anne of Green Gables story continues to generate money, and lots of it.

But now, Montgomery's heirs have convinced the Canadian government to extend the copyright term of her still-unpublished works for much longer: up to 96 years after her death.

Who knows why these works haven't been published to date? This bill would presumably result in these heirs making even more money. Why is that a problem? Simply because much more than Montgomery's estate is at stake.

The results will be that Canadians will have to wait another 14 to 34 years to get access to historical material in various estates of public persons who may wish to suppress it, or to price it so high as to effectively limit access, using the powerful weapon of copyright law.

If our heritage minister really wants Canadians to “tell our stories”, as she's fond of saying, she's about to force us to wait much longer before some of the really important stuff gets outed, heard, and published.

This bill would rewrite legislation passed just five years ago. It would extend copyright protection, as I said, by anywhere from 14 to 34 years, depending on the critical dates and strategies of the copyright lawyers and publishers involved.

Apart from Montgomery, some other examples of celebrated Canadians whose complete stories may remain untold for further decades—long past the lifetime of many of us in this room—could include: R.B. Bennett, who died in 1947, the Prime Minister of Canada during the Depression; Sir Robert Borden, who died in 1937, Prime Minister of Canada from 1911 to 1920, through the Great War, and an opponent of Laurier on reciprocity with the U.S.A., Canada's perennial issue; Stephen Leacock, who died in 1944 and who needs no introduction; Archibald Stansfeld Belaney, also known as Grey Owl, who died in 1938, a writer, conservationist, and want-to-be aboriginal; and apparently even the works of Sir Wilfrid Laurier. If there were unpublished letters of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who died in 1919, copyright protection could be extended under this bill until 2024, if they're first published before the end of this year.

There's the potential for an American-style copyright extension movement in Canada to spring from this effort. This could follow the controversial 20-year-term extension of the U.S.A., based on the dubious rationalization led by the Disney conglomerate that convinced the American government to extend copyright terms—even retroactively—for 20 years.

No matter how much one may wish to believe in the incentive theory of copyright, it's clear that Walt Disney and Lucy Maud Montgomery aren't going to be creating sequels to any of their works any time soon on this earth. Even the Americans acknowledge that copyright must end sometime. As my retailer clients say, “When it's gone, it's gone”.

An important decision came out of the United States Supreme Court yesterday, the Dastar decision, to that very effect: when the copyright is over, it's over. It goes into the public domain.

Overly long copyright terms are not a win-win result. They impose heavy dead-weight costs on society, in terms of lack of access to information, restricted research capacity, delayed or denied cultural production and evolution. Just as Bach copied and improved on Vivaldi, Disney copied and built on the Brothers Grimm, Kipling, and Victor Hugo. But now the Disney corporation doesn't want anybody else to repeat this formula for success any time soon, especially with their own productions.

Á (1140)

Quite apart from entertainment and mass culture, the study of history would be seriously affected, and thereby the evolution of history itself. Santayana said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” This bill will seriously hamper research on such crucial figures as Borden and Bennett, and Professor Granatstein is very concerned about that.

Under American law, the unpublished writings of a dead author are protected until January 1, 2002, or 70 years after his or her death, whichever comes later. Any unpublished work of John F. Kennedy, for example, would enter the public domain no later than 2033, even allowing for the 20-year Mickey Mouse extension.

The Americans basically figured this out back in 1976. Canada's only getting around to dealing with it now, and is being very indecisive.

We thought we had figured it out—or so it appeared—in 1997 with the passage of Bill C-32. One of the few user-friendly aspects of that package was the elimination of perpetual copyright on posthumous works. For those who died before 1949, there was a transitional grace period of five years. That was the deal. Mostly, the other provisions of the legislation were extremely harsh to academics, archivists, and librarians.

Now Minister Copps wants to rewrite the 1997 legislation to give the estates of dead authors something more, and to offer in return the easing of administrative burdens on the archivists. Frankly, Mr. Chairman, those burdens should never have been imposed in the first place, and were inconsistent with sensible notions of fair dealing, which should have been addressed in the 1997 amendments.

The consultations on the current proposal were minimal, and the process was all but hidden. When the consultant's report was published early in 2003, even those who knew about it were given only a few days to respond. The report lacked adequate detail and any comparative analysis, as required and warranted by the issues.

The institutional academic community in Canada unaccountably appears to have been either unaware or indifferent to the issues to date. Many distinguished academics in Canada are completely unaware of these provisions, perhaps because their own institutions or professional organizations have failed to inform them.

There's another problematic provision in the bill that—

Á (1145)

The Chair: Excuse me, Mr. Knopf. There's a 30-minute bell advising of a vote within 30 minutes. I would really encourage you to conclude briefly so that members can have a chance to question you in those....

Mr. Howard Knopf: Yes, Mr. Chairman. I was promised ten minutes, and I'll be well within that. I should be finished in two or three minutes.

The Chair: All right.

Mr. Howard Knopf: There's another problematic provision regarding copyright hidden away in the bill that has actually been discussed quite a lot this morning. That is the provision that so called “permits” the new amalgamated organization to take snapshots of websites to preserve them for history. Does this sound good? My friends here don' t think it's good at all.

I disagree with the provision for entirely different reasons. The problem with this so-called exception is that it implies that anyone other than the new institution who downloads and stores anything else from the Internet for research or private study is a copyright infringer, which is both politically and legally erroneous.

There's an outfit in the United States set up by a very rich gentleman called Brewster Kahle. It can be found through the website www.archive.org, which is a very elaborate and powerful mechanism of archiving the Internet. It's run by these rich folks down in the United States. Even under American law, it doesn't seem to have run into any copyright problems. You can be assured that if somebody thought there were some serious issues going on down there, a lawsuit would have been launched.

I don't think we need this provision in the act either. It's going to cause more harm than good. For entirely different reasons from those of my friends sitting at this table, I agree with them that the provision should be taken out.

The copyright provisions relating to the extension of copyright terms should be removed, excised from Bill C-36. They should be dealt with in the section 92 process. If absolutely necessary, the expiry date of December 31, 2003, for these controversial transition positions that would affect Montgomery and others could be extended for a year or so, so that this issue could be adequately and transparently considered in the section 92 process. The fact that the section 92 process is late in starting is no reason to make undue haste and commit further errors in public policy.

The process behind this bill raises discomforting questions. Are we beginning to see an American style of law-making involving stealth and submarine provisions attached to legislation to which there is little or no connection?

Just two weeks before this bill was introduced, Mr. Stockfish of Canadian Heritage and I were on a panel at Fordham University in New York, on April 24, 2003. He was telling a group of influential Americans about what was coming up in Canadian copyright law. He did not mention this bill, as far as I can remember. It came as a complete surprise to me and many others when it was introduced two weeks later, on May 8, 2003.

Mr. Chairman, are we witnessing the beginning of an “everyone for themselves” rush to patchwork copyright revision, with no overall plan intact? Even as I prepared these remarks, and even as we speak, the photographers have also just managed to have introduced a bill extending copyright terms in the other place, as Senate private member's Bill S-20, which apparently has Madam Copps's support.

Mr. Chairman, Bill C-36 seems to be on an apparently fast track and may become law soon. If it does, it should be without the unnecessary and problematic copyright provisions that were all too quietly included.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Knopf.

Mr. Strahl.

Mr. Chuck Strahl: Thank you all for appearing. None of us have very many minutes for questions, so I will just make a brief statement and then ask just one question.

I share your concerns, Mr. Knopf, on these amendments to the Copyright Act. I do think the Copyright Act should be reviewed in its entirety when it's changed and amended. In fact, that is something the ministers promised in times past. I share your concern. I'm not an historian, but I see other historians have already been quoted as having that concern.

Now, whether it will eventually be amended or not isn't as much of an issue to me as the fact that it should be added as a tag-on to this bill. So I agree with you, and we'll make amendments to that effect as this goes along. I don't know what the rest of the committee will feel about that. It's not that I'm against this idea; it's just it's the wrong way to go about it.

I do share your concern.

The other question I have is for Mr. Hosking. I appreciated your comments on the bill and on the archives generally. It makes us aware that there is even money to be made. We heard a kind of poetic explanation, and now we hear an actual monetary explanation of it all.

The archives and library claim that although there won't be any layoffs or problems in that area, there will be efficiencies of delivery, that some of your concerns will be addressed in the efficiency of delivery, so you can get a better product with the same number of people around, that kind of thing. But you say if we make any mistakes in the merger of these institutions, with the cultural differences and so on, it could be chaos--that was the word you used. Now, none of us wants chaos. That's why I've been asking what the plan is and saying let's get that plan well fleshed out.

Other than conversational chats with people when you're down there doing your research, have you submitted anything to them in terms of what they need to watch for or what your experience has been, or are we just going to have to hope for the best? You identified chaos as a potential outcome. None of us wants that. So what have you done to try to help them along with that?

Á (1150)

Mr. Fred Hosking: We had the opportunity to meet with Ian Wilson in January or February of this past year. We were also there with the representative from the Canadian Historical Association, in terms of giving some of our views and ideas on this issue. We also have the opportunity, actually this Thursday, for several of our researchers who have been invited to a session to discuss a number of the day-to-day operational issues we see.

As I pointed out, these are two very different institutions. Everything from even the basic stuff, like hours of operation, to how material is kept, how material is organized, to philosophical approaches and internal culture, is very different. We work at both institutions, so we see this a lot. It can't just be a matter of saying, “Okay, you're one institution. Good luck.”

And you mentioned earlier, in terms of this being a framework agreement, that there really needs to be a lot of thought given to how exactly it is going to work on the ground, how you are going to merge librarians and archivists. Often the views they share in terms of organization and handling material is very different. Just how one keeps archival material and how one keeps books and other material is very different. From an on-the-ground point of view, we've raised some of our concerns in terms of access to material, getting material, copying material, and that sort of thing.

We haven't been asked, nor do I know if we necessarily completely qualify, to speak on the higher-level, management side, as opposed to the operational. But we have been asked to meet with Ian Wilson. We have a meeting coming up to talk about our very specific concerns between the two institutions, how they work currently, and how they might work better together.

The Chair: Monsieur Ménard.

[Translation]

Mr. Réal Ménard (Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, BQ): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

In the fall of 2002—let me share some personal history with you— I took a course on copyright at the University of Ottawa. It wasn't the most exciting course I ever took, but it was not totally boring. I gather that two reviews of the act have already taken place and a third one is coming up. You are worried about the possibility that people may take material from the Internet to use it for the new institution.

To your knowledge, in the act as it now stands, is there a definition of the meaning of “unrestricted public access”? As legislators, how do you think we should understand this?

Secondly, the officials told the parliamentarians that there are similar provisions in other countries, like Sweden, Denmark, New Zealand, the United Kingdom or France. No doubt, we can more easily compare ourselves to France or to the United Kingdom. What do you say to the fact that we are probably not alone, but other jurisdictions have done what we are about to do if we adopt the bill as proposed?

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne: I would answer that the problem is not so much with the legislator. Perhaps that “unrestricted” means precisely that authorization must be obtained from the copyright holder. The problem is with the users. What we propose this morning, is to safeguard this interpretation, because “unrestricted” must mean “with authorization from the copyright holder”. You understood that we said that teaching institutions consider that they are not necessarily obliged to get authorization. These are the interpretations that worry us most. This is why we propose this amendment.

Á (1155)

Mr. Réal Ménard: Currently, in the act as it stands, there are exceptions for teaching institutions with regard to photocopying, for instance. There are management companies that can work in schools and collect copyright fees directly.

You are afraid of a potential violation of the Copyright Act as it stands.

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne: We mean that we want to make a connection between both acts. A user who refers to the National Archives Act may be unaware of the Copyright Act. We are proposing this amendment to the Copyright Act in order to make both acts compatible and consistent.

We must note that in the current Copyright Act, we have not yet debated the new technology proposed in the current act. This morning, we essentially must request an amendment to the Copyright Act. We are dealing with new technology and unrestricted public access to products. This is what worries us.

Mr. Réal Ménard: Yes, there could be some inconsistency.

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne: Yes, between the two acts.

Mr. Réal Ménard: Have you seen what was done in the countries I mentioned?

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne: We did not have the time—perhaps Marian had time—because we got the bill rather suddenly, as Mr. Knopf said, within the past two weeks. We would have liked to study it more exhaustively. I am sure that those in charge of this at Heritage Canada as well as the department lawyers could surely inform you about what was done elsewhere.

Mr. Réal Ménard: Except the one about copyrights, of course.

Ms. Francine Bertrand-Venne: Absolutely.

The Chair: Given the time constraints we have today, Ms. Venne, I suggest that before we move to the clause-by-clause study of the bill, if you have further research to do, do not hesitate to send the documents to the committee clerk. In any case, we will follow this lead.

[English]

What I suggest before we close--we have another 15 minutes--is that we refer to one member from the Liberal side, and Madam Lill.

Mrs. Lill, is that okay?

Are there any questions? Madam Frulla? Mr. Shepherd?

Mr. Alex Shepherd (Durham, Lib.): I have a quick question.

In your proposed amendment to this bill, you were concerned about the consent of authors. I guess when I look at my own background, from an administrative point of view, I see how difficult that would be. Maybe some of the other intervenors could tell us how difficult that's going to be to administer, that every time you access the Internet and find a piece of work you then go around and get specific consent.

Isn't it more important that you have the assurance of the institution itself that it's not going to redistribute the works?

Ms. Marian Hebb: That phrase “with the consent of the copyright owner” does not necessarily mean you have to get a written consent of the copyright owner in each instance. There is licensing through collective societies. Often, when somebody puts something on the Internet, they intend it to be copied by people. So when you go to the website, it is perfectly plain the copyright owner has put it there and does intend it to be copied. So that phrase is quite broad. Consent can be obtained in different ways and may not have to be obtained at all, other than just visiting the website and seeing that the material has been put up there for anyone to download.

The Chair: Thank you.

I have Madam Frulla and Ms. Lill, briefly.

Madam Frulla.

Mr. Alex Shepherd: I think Mr. Hosking wanted to comment.

The Chair: Mr. Hosking.

Mr. Fred Hosking: A lot of the copyright provisions that are being spoken about don't necessarily apply to us. The vast majority of the work we do is based on federal government records, so we're using departmental records of Indian Affairs or the Department of Justice, as opposed to personal records. We don't use the Internet so much for the information that's on it. For us, from a researcher's point of view, 90% of the material on the Internet isn't relevant and a lot of it isn't trustworthy. We use the Internet more as a tool to find out where information is kept, as opposed to for the information that's on it. Everything we look at on the web is viewed with a great deal of suspicion, and a large part of it isn't even legitimate from our point of view.

So we come at it from a different angle from that of my colleagues.

Â (1200)

The Chair: There are 13 minutes left before the vote. I suggest we cut off at 10 minutes.

Very briefly, Ms. Hebb, please.

Ms. Marian Hebb: I just wondered if I might respond to some of the things that were said by Mr. Knopf with respect to providing information. He raised a couple of questions.

The Chair: Why don't we just hear the two questioners, Ms. Frulla and Ms. Lill, and if there's time, certainly I'll give you time.

[Translation]

Ms. Liza Frulla (Verdun—Saint-Henri—Saint-Paul—Pointe Saint-Charles, Lib.): Let me come back briefly to what Mr. Shepherd said and also to what I was discussing with Mr. Carrier.

Government institutions must follow a supreme and overriding code of ethics, which consists in respecting government legislation. Mr. Carrier said that now they are being two or three times more careful about reproducing works and respecting copyrights, for photographs and other things as well.

Why are you so worried about this new bill in this case? Is it only because the term “unrestricted” is not defined? Is this what really worries you, or have past practices led you to believe that there has been a lessering in the respect of copyrights by both institutions?

Mr. Michel Beauchemin: I consulted our lawyer. I am not giving his name because he did not ask me to communicate this advice in this place. He told me that the place where the right of reprographic reproduction is probably the least respected is the Archives. Large amounts of photocopies of protected texts and works are made there, although I naively thought that this was done in the National Library. I am told that this mainly goes on in the Archives. According to our lawyer, many illegal things are done, entirely in good faith.

Our present concern is that in this whole debate on the review of the Copyright Act and its adaptation to new technology and to the new economy of knowledge which is emphasized in the upcoming phase of the review of the Copyright Act, we are under extreme pressure; we feel pressure from users both private and institutional, from libraries, educational institutions, universities, colleges, to give them free access to everything on the Internet and to hand over to copyright owners the responsibility of policing the Internet and defending themselves if their work is used.

In this context, when we saw this amendment which seems to be going in that general direction, we were, as we said, dismayed and unpleasantly surprised. We are not saying that the National Archives will start a wide commercial operation with this tomorrow morning, but we feel that there is a trend.

Against this background, we proposed this idea as our first option. Why not wait until next fall? This review will happen not in five years, 10 years or 20 years, it will be done next fall. Why not resume the entire debate then and see what must be done and what exceptions should be provided to whom on the web? Does this answer your question?

[English]

The Chair: We'll close with Mrs. Lill.

Ms. Wendy Lill: It's not often that we get two sides of an issue right with us together.

I'd like to know what your position is on this Mickey Mouse clause. It seems to be that we are hearing from you that the 20-year addition is needed to get us really in line with other countries around the world, possibly, around copyright. Could you speak to that in response to what Mr. Knopf said?

Ms. Marian Hebb: The issue with section 7 was the abruptness of the term. This is not a representation at the moment requesting that Canada go to the 70-year term, not in this instance concerning this section 7. The shortness is an issue because in fact with the Montgomery diaries, which Howard Knopf mentioned, they haven't been published because there is a problem of defamation or that people are still alive who could be hurt. So there is some stuff that cannot be published, even this long after the author's death. There also is an issue that 50 years isn't very long after someone has died. I once had a client who was an older poet who had had an affair with a man who was very much younger than she was, and she was very concerned in giving her papers to archives that in fact long after she had died this man and his family would be hurt by what she had written.

In the States, when they made the transition in the mid-seventies when they revised their copyright act very considerably, the extension—the window—that they gave to unpublished writers was about 25 years, approximately. Things did not come into the public domain until after the turn of the century.

I think there's a confusion here, because there is no problem with access to the material. All these materials, or most of these materials, are available in libraries and archives and people can get them. I think the real issue is whether or not somebody can publish them. That is a decision that we maintain should remain with the author or the author's estate for a reasonable period of time. I think that the four years with respect to unpublished material is much too short.

The Writers' Union is on record as putting forward a proposal that was intended to cure this. It was that we now have a very unique section in our Canadian Copyright Act that allows people who cannot find a copyright owner to go to the Copyright Board and ask for permission to be able to publish something, if they can't find the person to obtain their consent. The Writers' Union are not only copyright owners, but also users of copyright, and we would be very pleased if in fact that section were to be amended to deal with unpublished material. I think this would take care of a lot of the unpublished material—the letters, the things you can't find.

Jack Granatstein, I'm sure, is concerned because there are some letters that he couldn't actually publish. He can, of course, see them and he can read them. He can use them. But in the further changes to the Copyright Act, if the historians were to come forward with an amendment to ask whether they can make this section deal with unpublished material, the Writers' Union would be delighted.

Â (1205)

The Chair: I think we're going to close here. There's a vote in the House. I'm very sorry that we have to interrupt right now.

Thank you very much for coming. We really appreciate your presence. You've really helped us. And if you have any information you want to send by way of a brief or supplementary documentation, please feel very free to lodge it with the clerk.

The meeting is adjourned.