With the UK seeking new trade agreements as the country withdraws from the EU, there are considerations which creator organisations want to ensure Government take notice of.

AOI took part in a meeting with the British Copyright Council (BCC) and the Department for International Trade (DIT), who deal with trade agreements, in which the creator sectors – Artistic works, Literary works and Audiovisual/Film – presented their concerns regarding future post Brexit agreements. Following that we sent DIT a letter supporting the views expressed by the BCC.

These include:

That there is consultation on UK’s current copyright system regarding necessary modifications on withdrawal from the EU/ European Economic Area

The UK should work with the EU to improve the alignment of tax regimes, e.g. reduce the incidence of withholding tax.

There must be level playing field between individual creators and online content sharing services and other tech companies.

One of the issues which is important for creators is that a value gap exists – this is a mismatch between the value that internet service providers (ISPs) extract from creative works and the revenue returned to rights holders of the works. ISPs are building huge businesses drawing advertising on the back of creators’ content which may be uploaded without consent, using the ‘safe harbour’ hosting defence. This says they are not responsible for the content, they are solely ‘hosting’ it.

AOI support the BCC comment that copyright should not be used by Government for bargaining on trade agreements with other countries who may have less robust copyright regimes.

See Campaigning Informing new international trade negotiations for more