Directors UK Chair Steve Smith has provided the following message for members on the upcoming EU vote on the Copyright Directive in the Digital Single Market.
Please stand up for directors by contacting your MEPs and urging them to support the directive, using the template letter provided at the bottom of this page for inspiration.
Directors UK urgently needs the help of all our members to ensure UK MEPs vote #Yes2Copyright on 25th March, but it’s a race against time!
Only days before the UK is due to Brexit, the EU Copyright Directive is approaching its final vote in the European Parliament. It’s our last chance to ensure it passes into EU law before we leave the EU. If it doesn’t, many people say we could lose this opportunity to modernise copyright for a generation.
As directors, we now all work in a rapidly changing world of video-on-demand platforms and streaming services. More of our work is increasingly used online - for which we currently receive no royalties. Existing copyright laws were made before online platforms such as YouTube, Google and Facebook existed.
The EU Copyright Directive would, for the first time, give European directors the following rights:
• The right to fair and proportionate remuneration for uses of your work online
• The right to receive information about the uses of your work
• A right to request renegotiation of your contract if it turns out that you do not receive proportionate remuneration, and
• The right to access a disputes resolution process
This new law would help Directors UK negotiate better deals with the giant SVOD platforms to ensure you are fairly rewarded when your work is used online. It’s one of the reasons we have been asking you to sign the new Directors Licensing Scheme Collection Agreement.
Following years of intense debate and negotiations, directors are just one step away from gaining this right to fair remuneration, but the whole deal rests on a knife-edge. MEPs have faced a sustained campaign of lobbying and disinformation from technology giants, who are still spending millions of dollars lobbying MEPs to get them to reject the directive.
Many UK MEPs remain undecided, so we need one final push to urge them to reach a decision that will benefit directors — and indeed all those who produce creative works — right across Europe.
That’s why we need you to contact your MEPs (via email or post) and ask them to support the directive.
To help you we’ve produced a template letter below, so all you need to do is add your name and address (so that your MEPs know that you are a constituent) and your MEP’s name.
To find out who your MEPs are, please follow this link. We recommend using this resource only for finding your MEPs’ contact details. Please contact them using your own email provider, or, if using the link above, ensure that you have susbtantially altered the text of the template email before sending.
Until now, directors have had scant financial reward for the success of their work online. This is a bold step towards changing that, creating a much-needed level playing field between us, the creators, and those who communicate and distribute our works on different media and platforms. It is essential to the sustainability of our activities and therefore of the cultural and artistic diversity of Europe.
Please take this opportunity to help us make sure this happens.
Thank you for your support.
Steve Smith, Chair of Directors UK
PLEASE FIND OUR TEMPLATE LETTER BELOW
Subject: Vote YES to the copyright directive
Dear [insert MEP name],
As a UK screen director I am writing to ask you to vote to adopt the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market at the European Parliament vote scheduled for 25 March 2019.
The Directive creates a much-needed level playing field between individual authors and creators, and those who distribute our creative works on a growing variety of platforms, whilst giving audiences better access to a wider array of content.
It will be of lasting benefit to the careers of British creators and to the wider UK economy - to which the creative industries contribute £92bn a year. It will fairly reward and incentivise creators and our industry to achieve innovation and success. It will create an environment of stability between companies and creative individuals that will protect and enhance the UK as a destination for production. It is essential to the sustainability of our activities.
A recent FERA survey of European directors found that the average annual income of a TV and film director is €18,000. In the UK, income for directors has been falling in real terms as more of our work is used online - for which we currently receive no royalties. Existing copyright laws were made before online platforms such as YouTube, Google and Facebook existed and became major influences over our interaction with culture and media.
It is in everyone’s interests to promote authors’ rights so that we may continue to create, and in doing so bring lasting benefits to the whole of society. To retain the UK and Europe’s best talents and build the next generation of creators, we must safeguard creators’ rights and promote their livelihoods. We cannot afford to wait another decade for copyright legislation to be adapted to the digital environment.
You have the opportunity to send a historical and positive message to future generations of creators: that they are valued and that they will be fairly remunerated for their work.
For creators, such as myself, to be able to make a living today and tomorrow, and for audiences to be able to continue enjoying our work in today’s digital environment I urge you to say yes to this reform and adopt the Copyright Directive.
Yours Sincerely
[insert your Name]
Credits: [insert example credits]