Triennial review of the code of conduct
March 31, 2022
As we reported in last November’s Creative Licence (here), a Triennial Review of the Code of Conduct for Copyright Collecting Societies has been conducted, and the report is available here. The public meeting on 7 February 2022 was attended by representatives of each of the copyright collecting societies (including Copyright Agency), Copyright Advisory Group to the Australian Education Senior Officials Committee (CAG), and Universities Australia (UA).
CAG and UA have made submissions to the Triennial Code Reviewer, although they are not seeking any amendments to the Code. Both CAG and UA are represented on the Board of the Australian Digital Alliance (ADA), whose members include technology companies like Google and Facebook. CAG, UA and ADA also made submissions in July and August 2021 to the Annual Code Reviewer, who reviews collecting societies’ compliance with the Code of Conduct (see here). As explained by the Annual Code Reviewer in his report on compliance for 2020–21 (here at page 115), he referred these submissions to the Triennial Code Reviewer as they were not complaints about collecting societies’ compliance with the Code but ‘rather in the nature of complaints about the system of governance represented by a voluntary code of conduct’.
CAG, UA and ADA have also sought changes to the Copyright Act that would reduce payments from the education sector to the creative industries.
We have responded to the Code Reviewer on the matters raised in each of these submissions.