Commerce Minister Cameron Brewer has headlined the Government’s decision to extend copyright protections by 20 years as helping Kiwi bands like Split Enz, Dragon, Th’ Dudes and Hello Sailor – groups whose earliest songs are already 50 years old.
The changes will extend copyright protection for music recordings from 50 to 70 years after publication. Other types of works will be protected for 70 years after the creator’s death.
But the media release is timed for NZ Music Month. It doesn’t detail how the law change will provide greater protection for multinationals like drug marketers and health software firms – like the so-called ‘Mickey Mouse Law’ lobbied for by Disney, that the White House is now urging other nations to adopt.
The 70 years goes well beyoind the “life-plus-50” standard required by the World Trade Organization.
But Australia made the move to a life-plus-70 term in 2004, the result of a trade deal with the US – and now New Zealand to comply with its own trade deals. Brewer tells Newsroom it’s not been pressured into the extension by the USA: “The intent of the proposals is to meet the requirements under the EU and UK free trade agreements, rather than other overseas jurisdictions,” he says.
Previoiusly, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade calculated that longer copyright terms would cost New Zealanders around $55m a year.
International copyright lawyer Michael Wolfe has previously argued, at Newsroom, that the free trade deal provision that will see New Zealand ship tens of millions of dollars overseas annually, most of it to countries that aren’t even from the UK – in service of a policy that experts around the world agree is simply no good.
A previous review of the Copyright Act, launched in 2018, was quietly shelved, Wolfe said, with competing interests from large-scale rights holders and the creative community acting as a complication. “There’s a lot of people you can piss off … but there’s not a lot of people you can please, so politically it’s a difficult subject.”
Bell Gully partner Richard Massey, a specalist in intellectual property law, says that in some respects, New Zealand’s proposed extension is similar to changes made under US copyright law in 1998, famous for keeping Mickey Mouse out of the public domain, in that it effectively extends copyright terms by 20 years.
That is, copyright protection for music recordings will extend from 50 years to 70 years after publication and other types of works will be protected for 70 years after the creator’s death (currently 50 years).
However, the background to the changes is different, he says. The US amendments in 1998 are sometimes seen as resulting from pressure from the creative industries, whereas the proposed New Zealand changes reflect treaty obligations under free trade agreements with the UK and the EU, as the announcement notes.
“The main advantage of extended terms is that creators and their families can benefit financially from their work for longer – which is an important benefit, particularly for works that achieve enduring commercial success.”
The change also aligns New Zealand with many other jurisdictions, including several of its major trading partners, which may simplify rights management for works exploited internationally. “The flipside is that extending copyright means that protected material will remain commercially unavailable to the public and other creators for longer.”
Although the announcement focuses on music recordings, in celebration of New Zealand Music Month, the scope of the proposed changes is broader. Copyright exists in literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works, as well as in sound recordings, films, communication works, and typographical arrangements of published editions.
Currently, copyright in literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works expires 50 years after the author’s death, while copyright in sound recordings and films expires 50 years after creation or publication.
The announcement indicates that all of these categories will be brought to a 70-year term. In other words, novels, screenplays, paintings and other similar works will all receive the extended protection.
“One benefit for the EU and the UK in relation to these specific aspects of the FTAs is ensuring that the rights of their own creators and cultural industries, such as music labels, film studios and performers, receive more consistent protection,” Massey says.
“New Zealand’s current shorter term allowed works by European and UK artists to fall into the public domain earlier than they would in their own jurisdictions and the extension effectively closes that gap.”
