The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Retail Council of Canada and a coalition of six major electronics retailers (the "Retailers") were pleased that the Supreme Court of Canada has refused to give leave to appeal to the Canadian Private Copying Collective (CPPC) on the issue of whether devices such as iPods and the memory embedded in them could be levied. The Federal Court of Appeal has ruled that they cannot. Diane J. Brisebois, President and CEO of Retail Council of Canada, emphasized that this will save millions of dollars for Canadian consumers and will increase pressure on Parliament to get rid of the controversial levy. "Clearly Parliament must deal with this legislation sooner rather than later. It isn't working for anyone," Brisebois said. "It should be repealed as quickly as possible." The Court also announced that it would not hear an appeal by Retail Council of Canada on the constitutionality of the "levy". The Copyright Board of Canada has imposed a levy of $0.21 payable to the music industry on each blank CD-R, as well as other recordable media, which affects virtually all Canadian consumers of these products, whether or not they use the products to record music. When the levy scheme was being considered by Parliament prior to its passage in 1997, it was being promoted as applying to blank audiocassettes. However, it has now been extended by the Copyright Board to cover computer media, much, if not most of which, is used for purposes completely unrelated to music, such as storing digital photographs or backing up business and personal data. The levy has created significant distortions in the North American market, since there is no levy on blank data CDs in the U.S.A. Indeed, the Canadian levy, which is applied at the wholesale level, exceeds the common retail price of blank CD-Rs in the U.S.A. Retail Council of Canada expressed disappointment that the Court declined to hear the constitutional case. However, she indicated that the battle on the levies is far from over. "This ruling does not mean that the levy is constitutionally valid," Brisebois said. "It simply means the Supreme Court has decided not to consider this question at this time. However, it could still come up again in the future." Retail Council of Canada also believes that the decision will have a positive impact on the Retailers' campaign to repeal the levy scheme. "Unless the levy scheme is repealed, we will see even greater costs to Canadians and inefficiencies in the copyright system. If the Government proceeds to ratify the WIPO treaties, which the music industry so desperately wants, without repealing the levy scheme, we will see the costs literally double as a result of international law requirements, with all the extra money leaving the country," Brisebois indicated. "This could quickly cost Canadians hundreds of millions of dollars and that would simply be unacceptable."
