Michael McDowell
National University of Ireland · Independent · Ireland
“Then I think of this particular Chamber where people are polite and kind to each other and listen to each other respectfully. There is no baying or shouting down or whatever. It is a great tribute to the Seanad staff that that spirit continues to exist in this House.”
“I note that the whole scheme of the planning Act is that exempt development proposals are considered by the Houses. It is questionable whether this House has really considered the exempt development regulations. Without debate, we sent them off to a committee.”
“I am one of the people who disagrees with the substance of that report. We have to have a real solid debate on it here in this House, not merely a cursory one. It is an issue of fundamental importance. It cannot be avoided, one way or the other. Whatever your views are on it, it needs to be thrashed out.”
“Although coming up to the end of this term we are rushing things through, and the guillotine is well-oiled and slicing this way and that, we have a lot of work to do in the autumn.”
“The people who did that were brought before the International Court of Justice and condemned and imprisoned. If Ireland does not clearly state that there are to be consequences for people who do things like what Mladić, Milošević and Karadžić were brought to account for, if we are incapable as a State of publicly saying that what Secretar…”
“If we cannot, as a State, say publicly to Rubio, "Hands off the International Criminal Court", when they were quite happy when the people who did the 7,000 murders in Srebrenica got their just desserts, but when there is any suggestion that what has happened in Gaza, with 70,000 innocent people killed by aerial bombardment and land bombar…”
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“– the Court of Justice of the European Union and found himself driven to the point that in those circumstances the State, which had already said it was in breach of an obligation to provide accommodation but did not have that accommodation, must compensate people. It should be remembered that in that particular case the State conceded it was in breach of its obligations. The real issue was whether the non-availability of accommodation could give rise to a claim of compensation by people who were denied it. I do not know, and I shudder to think, how many other people reading that fine judgment are consulting solicitors around this city at the moment wondering what they are entitled to for the fact that they spent weeks on the Grand Canal in tents and the like. I do not know what the result will be.”
“However, let us be honest: the High Court, under the very estimable, respectable and highly gifted judge Mr. Justice Cian Ferriter, has recently had to award compensation, effectively damages, to asylum seekers who came here at a time when there was no accommodation available to them. They had to sleep homeless. We all saw what happened during that critical period. The average citizen here wonders how it can possibly be that somebody who opts to come to Ireland when there is no accommodation gets compensated for the choice they make. How does that make sense? It does not make sense. It does make sense in one area, however, and that is legally. Mr. Justice Ferriter in a very considered judgment examined all the case law of – guess what?”
“My next point is we have a very sophisticated apparatus in this country compared with what I found when I was made Minister for justice in succession to the Minister, John O'Donoghue, in 2002. At that time, the State was utterly unprepared for the influx of applicants who sought asylum in Ireland. We were unprepared for it and were defenceless in many respects. We had not put in place procedures or agencies or the like to deal adequately with the fact that people were claiming asylum. In the meantime, let us also remember, we have spent billions of euro on the accommodation of asylum seekers, the majority of whom are not entitled to asylum. The public rightly asks what the procedures are whereby some people can become multimillionaires providing the State with this accommodation in the circumstances in which we find ourselves.”
“The Minister has talked about the figures that went up and down over the years. I do not want to be unfair to the former Minister, Roderic O'Gorman, who is a Member of the Dáil. He told us at one stage about three years ago that we would have to get used to an asylum-seeking migration volume of applications of between 25,000 and 30,000 people per annum. That is what he said. The fact that it is down to 13,000 now is good because the great majority of it, as the Minister has said, is not justified. Let us be clear about it: the great majority of applicants who stay to have their applications dealt with are found not to be entitled to asylum status in Ireland.”
“In the entire duration of this debate in this House, I hear the conflation of migration, the rights of migrants in international law and the fact that there are international commissions on migration on the one hand, and the people who are trafficked by criminals internationally. The conflation of those two sets of people is very easily done especially by those who wish to blur the distinction. That is a point that we find all the time in public discourse on this issue. On the one hand people, including me, would point to the positive aspects of migration, economic migration, providing it is lawful and to the role of the Minister's Department and other Departments in securing migration where it is needed for our social and economic benefit and on the other hand, to the whole process of asylum seeking.”
“They are ripped off systematically by gangsters the whole way whenever that possibility exists. In some cases, they are put to terrible risks like travelling in a container in which some of them are liable to be suffocated, or crossing the Mediterranean or crossing the English Channel in circumstances where their lives are massively at risk, all on the basis that they are paying to participate in this process. That whole illegal migration into Europe is a massive international racket. It is criminal and it is wrong. It is not to be condoned for one minute. The expectations, hopes and aspirations of those people who avail of it is one set of things but the terrible abuses of the people who are trapped in this process is another.”
“They are more likely than not in some circumstances to succeed. I do not morally condemn people who see that opportunity. If the Americans had a system whereby the Irish undocumented were effectively given a legal channel to stay within the United States permanently, the flow of Irish people to America in those years would have been huge. However, they did not. The Americans are more stern than we have ever been in relation to undocumented people and now things have got to a really appalling situation with ICE and the Trump Administration. Those people who travel from Vietnam, west Africa, the Maghreb and east Africa are part, generally speaking, of a major international racket. They are asked for what for them are huge sums of money, thousands of euro, to begin their journey to Ireland or to Europe.”
“The European Union has, and I use this word with a degree of cynicism, decided that it has competence in this area when it has proven generally that it has absolutely no competence in the sense that the ordinary person would give to that phrase. Where the European Union has created a legal construct which allows people to travel to Europe by one means or another, and then to claim asylum, it is almost inevitable that anybody who sees an opportunity, even if the odds are against them in the sense that the Minister says that the majority of applicants are now refused in Ireland, to get to Europe and be one of the 1 million people who Senator Keogan mentioned are seeking asylum status in Europe, it is perfectly understandable that they will do it. Why not? It is a good toss of the coin.”
“It is perfectly understandable that these young men, in general terms, from west Africa, the Maghreb, east Africa, the Middle East, Afghanistan and Vietnam, who live in those countries see an opportunity to come to Europe and to participate in the advanced economy of the European Union and to avail of the fact that the state in the European Union will look after them to some extent in a way which other states would not. I want to put on the record that moral condemnation of migrants, a term which I use advisedly, is not part of my thought process or my approach. The European Union and its member states have put together an elaborate legal construct based on what is in Article 18 of Charter of Fundamental Rights, namely the right to asylum.”
“I want to put on the record of this House, lest anybody misinterpret anything I say in the course of the debate on this Bill, that I do not morally condemn young men, in particular, from disadvantaged parts of the world who see in Europe the opportunity of a better life from an economic and social point of view. I make no moral condemnation of them, no more than we collectively made moral condemnations of our own nationals who, at times in the past, went to the United States, outstayed their welcome and became illegal there.”
“Is someone who crosses the Border from the United Kingdom and applies for asylum in Dublin capable or not of being dealt with under the asylum border procedure and does or does not the 12-week examination period apply to such people?”
“They have been told that this migration pact was the answer to all our problems and would speed things up, whereas, as far as I know, none of the people who travel through the UK has ever, at Carrickarnon or anywhere else on the Border, applied for asylum. This goes to the heart of the matter. The public is told this is a miracle solution to all of our problems because all of these people to whom this procedure applies will be dealt with in 12 weeks. However, they will not because the courts will be invoked almost immediately, I am sure. Even if we leave out the courts, my understanding is that we are dealing here with a procedure that is not available if somebody just applies in Dublin. I ask the Minister to give a yes or no answer to this question.”
“If it is the case that the people have been told, as they have been, that the migration pact gives this State the opportunity to dramatically speed up the treatment of asylum applications and that there will be a 12-week limit - we have not even talked about judicial review - and if the Minister is not in a position to tell this House that the great majority of asylum applicants will not be capable of being dealt with under it because they will not have made an application at a Border crossing point, then, while the urgency of this is being spun as a reason to rush it through, the reality is that the Irish people have been sold a pup.”
“Is the public being fed a completely distorted view that this legislation somehow speeds up the asylum procedure when, in fact, the speeded-up process, under Chapter 6, will not apply to people who cross the Border, come to Dublin and ask for asylum in Dublin? Is my understanding correct or incorrect on that? This goes to the heart of this Bill.”
“Who are these people who are to be caught by Chapter 6 of the Bill? We are being told that this is urgent and that Ireland has to do this by 12 June but this is completely unworkable if it does not apply to people who turn up in Dublin, having availed of the common travel area to get in here. I am asking the Minister to explain to whom the asylum order procedure and the 12-week limit on determining asylum applications, as provided for in Chapter 6, is going to apply. Is it going to somebody who arrives at Carrickarnon where there used to be a border post and is foolish enough to apply in that place for asylum or is this entirely illusory?”
“Yes but I believe this is relevant. The Minister is entitled to apply the border procedure in the circumstances set out in subsection 2 of that section. They are the only circumstances in which it can be done. It seems to me that with the exception of paragraph (a), paragraphs (b), (c) and (d) are not really relevant to the claims made by the Government that this is going to massively speed up the investigation and decision-making process because the asylum border procedure can only take place following an application made at an external border crossing point or in a transit zone. The Minister has gone on record to say that the great majority of asylum applications are made by people who have transited into the State via the United Kingdom. What is an external border crossing?”
“Unless Ireland is in a position to operate the border procedure, this Bill and our adherence to the pact are, by virtue of the common travel area, almost set at naught. I would like the Minister to explain to the House how the asylum border procedure will operate in Ireland and who will be caught by it. Is it somebody crossing the Border at Carrickarnon in County Louth? Is it somebody who appears in Dublin and claims asylum? When does the asylum border procedure actually become available to the Irish State?”
“Today? It did not get to me. I am just making that point. I am taken by surprise by that ruling. I do not understand why a commencement section is somehow out of order when it is specified that such a change should be made. I will not call a vote on the section, but I am very much taken aback by that ruling. The Bill was guillotined through the Dáil, and we now find ourselves dealing with it in this House. There are provisions in section 126 of the Bill that are an integral part of the border procedure aspects of the migration pact. Section 126 is part of the asylum border procedure. We have been told that this Bill is going to dramatically change and accelerate the circumstances in which asylum applications are dealt with.”
“Nobody ever said the people were deceived, they should have had the information, the Electoral Commission was wrong and Ministers who said that this would make no difference were all wrong. I am standing up here today, two years after International Women's Day was chosen cynically as the date on which these two referendums were to be enacted by the people, to say that the mere fact that the then Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, resigned and the mere fact there was a change in some of the Ministries does not justify the wrong that was done to the Irish people and the deliberate effort that was made to pervert democracy by misinforming and starving the people of information to which they were entitled.”
“It was deliberately concealed from the Irish people that the wording of that referendum had been deliberately changed from earlier drafts in order to make it absolutely clear that no person could rely on the proposed new article for relief in the courts so that those who were caring would not have justiciable rights under that particular article. The then Taoiseach wrote an article in the Irish Independent saying that he accepted the wisdom of the people. That was Leo Varadkar. He then left Ireland for St. Patrick's Day in New York. Within a week, he was gone. He gave a press conference in Government Buildings. However, nobody has ever apologised to the Irish people for the wrongs that were done to them. I will finish on this point.”
“The litany of untruths that was perpetrated on the Irish people at that stage, combined with the extraordinarily dishonest arrogance of saying people's right to know what Departments were warning the Government about would be postponed until after the referendum itself was completed, was perpetrated by a Government that had the arrogance to say it was important to make these changes on International Women's Day. I am no expert on it but I believe that the great majority of women came out against it because they could see through it and saw it was a nonsense. The care referendum was put forward as somehow conferring some status on people who were caring for disabled people within the family.”
“Worst of all was that the Referendum Commission, not content with talking nonsense about Christmas cards and wedding invitations, actually told the Irish people the article in the Constitution about women not being obliged to work outside the home due to economic necessity had never been considered by the courts to any significant degree. That was blatantly untrue. There was case law that showed that the Supreme Court had invoked it to protect women whose marriages were breaking up from being forced out to work by husbands who said they were well capable of working instead of looking after the family.”
“It was pointed out that there would be very significant implications in relation to disputes as to who was entitled to succeed in succession cases, who was entitled to come here on a family reunion basis under immigration law, who was to be regarded as the partner under pension law, and which family arrangements would attract taxation protections and allowances. Right across the board, the Irish people were systematically deceived by the then Government. There is no other description of what happened. The relevant Minister had been warned that there were very serious implications for our society if the referendum was carried.”
“One Minister of the then Government after another came before cameras and microphones and declared solemnly that they had legal advice that there would be no significant changes arising from the "durable relationship" clause. It transpired that all the information and misinformation was false. It transpired after the event that various Departments had pointed out to the Department of Finance and various other Departments of State, including the Department of Justice, that there would be very significant implications to introducing the notion of "durable relationship" at the same status as marriage.”
“When those who could see there were clear implications for family law, succession law, taxation law, immigration law and pensions law, among others, sought from the Irish people's Government some indication of the analysis done by the various Departments of State as to what the implications of the constitutional changes in relation to the nature of the family would mean, by means of freedom of information requests, the Departments in question refused to answer. The excuse given was that the people had yet to make up their mind on the issue. Can you imagine not being able to find out the consequences until you make up your mind?”
“The chair of the commission, when asked what the term "durable relationship" meant, said she could not advance any real definition but said you would know a durable relationship if you got a wedding invitation or a Christmas card addressed to you jointly. The Minister in charge told the Irish people solemnly that the definition of "durable relationship" would be left to the courts and that he himself would offer no definition as to what it meant. However, he gave the assurance that the term was not the same as the term "durable relationship" when used in European law.”
“I thank the Leader for arranging a debate on International Women's Day, even though the day itself will be next week. Due to the St. Patrick's Festival, we are considering it today. My mind goes back two years to 8 March 2024. That was the occasion chosen specially for two referendums to amend the Constitution. One of them was to introduce the concept of "durable relationship", in addition to marriage, as the basis for the family, and the other was to introduce a new provision in the Constitution in relation to care. Those two referendums were defeated decisively by the Irish people. I have a few comments to make on the referendums in retrospect. We may have forgotten what happened in the course of the referendum campaigns. First, the Referendum Commission failed abysmally to explain what the referendum changes would mean.”
“Successive Governments – I am not making party political points – have effectively collapsed the capacity of reservists in this country to come out, bear arms and serve the State. It is easy to spend €600 million on armoured personnel carriers. You just put in the order and they arrive. It is easy to order a radar system; the French will deliver it as soon as they are asked. Getting people into the reserve and re-establishing it to 15,000 or 20,000 people who could serve the State is the difficult bit. In the context of what happened with the Garda Reserve, the Civil Defence and right across the board, failing to engage ordinary men and women in serving their country has been our biggest failure. That is the difficult bit for the Government and the Department of Defence. Numbers matter.”
“I welcome the Minister of State. I will make one contribution, although I would love to say many things. Carrying on from where Senator O’Reilly left off, the numbers in the Reserve Defence Force have fallen to a pitiful amount. In my experience and lifetime, there were in excess of 20,000 people who could, if asked by the State, bear arms or turn out for the security of the State. They could use their military training and experience to support the State. It is extremely naive to think this country will never have a security crisis again. When that time comes, it could arise out of Northern Ireland, a border poll or Farage becoming Prime Minister of the UK and loyalists responding in a particular way. We could have a crisis on our hands very quickly.”
“Who in their right mind thinks it is a good idea that, after a morning hearing landlord and tenant applications, new licensing applications for licensed premises and family law disputes, a Circuit Court judge is then, possibly for the one and only time in their life, confronted with the function of determining what is or is not equitable remuneration, how it should be divided and what are or are not reasonable costs of collection? We need clarity now. This is the time for clarity, not on Report Stage. Why is this being done?”
“All of these things need to be clarified in the House as to why this is a move forward. Senator Conway has drawn the House's attention to the fact that, as far as he and the people who have briefed him are aware, no other country in the European Union has decided to vest the adjudication of equitable remuneration disputes in the court system, which is an adversarial one. The British have not done this. They have a copyright tribunal or whatever. We have a copyright tribunal in the form of the Controller of Intellectual Property. We are entitled to a fair and straight answer. Did the controller say he was sick of this jurisdiction, he could not handle it and it should be sent to the courts? Alternatively, is it the case that there is such a volume of these disputes that the office of the controller is under-resourced to deal with them?”
“Are the decisions to be made on the basis of higher quality? Another question that arises has to do with what Circuit Court judge is going to deal with it. Is it going to be the Dublin Circuit Court? Is it going to be the Circuit Court in Tralee, Galway or wherever else of an afternoon? How is the venue decided? One of the points in the amendment in the names of Senator Conway and me is that, where an individual holder of the performing right is involved, namely, the artist holding that copyright, it should be written into any procedure that they can be represented by a collective party. However, as I read the Minister of State's amendment, there is no provision of that kind. The person has to be the holder of the copyright or the holder of the copyright in the sound recording.”
“I will elaborate on what Senators Conway, Higgins and Black have said. I ask the Minister of State to explain to the House where the initiative to transfer the Controller of Intellectual Property's jurisdiction to the Circuit Court came from. Whose idea was it? Did the controller say he was inundated with these disputes and, therefore, was overwhelmed and could not do the work and it would be better if the Circuit Court, that august institution that has not enough to do between its licensing and family law cases, take over this jurisdiction? Why is it that Ireland is deciding this? We need answers from the Minister of State on this because this is Committee Stage, where questions have to be answered. Precisely what advantage is seen in vesting this jurisdiction in the Circuit Court?”
“I ask the Minister of State to explain to us why it is the case that the Circuit Court is now considered to be a preferable, cheaper, more accessible and more just decision-making process than the existing controller.”
“I look forward to the Minister of State explaining why the Government has considered that a jurisdiction which at the moment operates satisfactorily before the controller should be taken away from a one-person tribunal and vested in the Circuit Court. What Circuit Court are we concerned with? The Circuit Court under the Constitution is permitted on the basis that it is a court of local and limited jurisdiction. What local jurisdiction are we dealing with? Is it based on the local jurisdiction of the applicant or of the company that appears to have copyright of the sound recording? What is the purpose of this change? It is not clear.”
“Why should there be an interparty litigation before a Circuit Court judge? A Circuit Court has plenty of other work without requiring its judges to put on a different hat and start considering the whole question of equitable remuneration between various categories of copyright holders. What is the advantage of this? Is it suggested that when people bring a barrister and solicitor to the Circuit Court, it will be cheaper than appearing before the controller? I do not see why that should be the case. In court, who will have right of audience? Will it be representatives or lay litigants in the form of the performers? Will it be lawyers? I do not see the advantage of giving to the Circuit Court this new function.”
“The term "either party", in this context, appears to mean that the performer or owner of the sound recording are the only parties we are dealing with. The unfairness of that is that performers are not in the same position as PPI or PPL to have solicitors at their beck and call. To cast upon an individual performer the obligation of going to court to establish the divvying up of equitable remuneration is inherently unfair. At the moment, the controller has jurisdiction to carry out this allocation function. No good excuse has been tendered in public, at any rate, for transferring the controller's functions to the Circuit Court. I have a number of points to make about that. What Circuit Court are we dealing with? Why should the controller not carry out this function? Why should it be a court procedure?”
“The Leas-Chathaoirleach will note that under subsection (3C) of the Minister's version, it is provided that: Where a performer and an owner of the copyright in a sound recording do not reach an agreement under subsection (3B), either party may serve a notice, in such form and manner as the Minister may prescribe, on the other party of its intention to make an application to the Circuit Court under subsection (3D) if no agreement under subsection (3B) is reached within 6 months (or such shorter period as may be agreed by the parties) of service of the notice. Under this proposal, what happens then is that where such a notice is served and the period has expired without agreement, either party may make an application to the Circuit Court for an order to determine how equitable remuneration shall be shared between the parties concerned.”
“The second aspect of the amendment is to substitute "collective management organisation" for "collecting society" in section 208(2) of the principal Act. The third proposition is that: Where the method of [dividing or] sharing the equitable remuneration in accordance with subsection (1) is not acceptable to a performer or an owner of the copyright in a sound recording, an alternative method may be agreed by or on behalf of the performer and the owner of the copyright concerned.”
“The context of the amendment is that section 2 of the Bill as proposed by the Minister sets out a series of steps to be taken in the event of a dispute as to equitable remuneration. It states that "equitable remuneration less reasonable collecting costs shall be shared equally as between a performer and an owner of the copyright in a sound recording." Instead of the very vague phrase "reasonable collection costs", the amendment refers to the "deduction of the justifiable and documented costs of collection". At the moment, if you vest in the sound recording copyright owner's organisation - and these are powerful organisations - the presumption that what it says is reasonable, that casts on the artist the obligation to prove it is unreasonable, which is unfair.”
“I move amendment No. 2: In page 3, between lines 13 and 14, to insert the following: “Amendment of section 208 of Principal Act 2. Section 208 of the Principal Act is amended— (a) By the substitution of the following subsection for subsection (1): “(1) A performer has the right to share equally with the copyright owner in a sound recording the equitable remuneration for which provision is made in section 38, subsections (1) and (2), after deduction of the justifiable and documented costs of collection.”, (b) in subsection (2), by the substitution of “collective management organisation” for “collecting society”, (c) by the substitution of the following subsection for subsection (4): “(4) Where the method of sharing the equitable remuneration in accordance with subsection (1) is not acceptable to a performer or an owner of the copyright in a sound recording, an alternative method may be agreed by or on behalf of the performer and the owner of the copyright concerned.”, (d) by the substitution of the following subsection for subsection (5): “(5) In the event of a dispute arising under this section, including as to the amount of equitable remuneration payable under subsection (1) or the method of calculation thereof, the person by or to whom it is payable may apply to the Controller for an order under subsection (8).”, (e) by the substitution of the following subsection for subsection (8): “(8) (a) On an application being made under this subsection, the Controller shall consider the matter and make such order as to the method of calculating and paying equitable remuneration as he or she may determine to be reasonable in the circumstances, (b) the Controller may make a party to any such proceedings a person or organisation satisfying the Controller that the party concerned has a substantial interest in the matter.”.””
“Instead of clarifying the right is a shared right or even modifying the monopoly granted to the producers with conditions that strike a fair balance between performers and producers, the Bill, in its present form, will seriously damage performers' interests. It is in that context this amendment has been formulated. The purpose of this new subparagraph (3A) is to make it clear what the nature of equitable remuneration is - a right to receive equitable remuneration to be shared between the owner of the sound recording and performers whose performances are incorporated in the sound recording.”
“That enabled PPI to allocate royalties to what were termed "non-qualifying performers" and to divert those royalties to producers. In the five years that followed that, between 2020 and now, the State has failed to implement the ruling of the court. PPI has continued to withhold the sums due to those performers whom it disqualified on the basis of the discredited section of the principle Act. Now, the Government appears to be in a great hurry to put an end to this long and embarrassing delay in implementing the ruling of the ECJ before the State takes up the Presidency of the European Union in July. Patently, that is the State's only interest.”
“PPI has also incrementally adopted new "rules", as it put it, affecting the performance shares and driving down payments to performers to less than 25% of the total amount collected. The recording artists' organisation has been in litigation with PPI since July 2016 at enormous expense to the performers and under the threat it may ultimately not be able to survive. PPI and PPL members are very wealthy organisations whereas the performing artists are, by definition, much more vulnerable and much less organised. In the course of the litigation I have just referred to, the High Court referred several questions to the Court of Justice of the European Union, ECJ. On 8 September 2020, the court ruled that Ireland had failed to transpose the directive by confining the right to remuneration to a limited set of performers.”
“In accordance with its database of performer information and its distribution rules, the recording artists' organisation then distributed the payment among the performers of the played tracks. This agreement operated consensually until the year 2014, when PPI decided to change the methodology for calculating the performers' share. When the recoding artists' organisation objected, PPI terminated the agreement. Over the period since then, PPI, with the assistance of Phonographic Performance Limited, PPL, which is a similar organisation in the United Kingdom and has among its participants Universal Music Group, Warner Music and Sony Music, has taken over all aspects of the management of the performer share of the single payment, rendering the recording artists' organisation redundant in relation to its key function.”
“There is considerable dissatisfaction on the part of recording artists that EU Directive 2006/115/EC on rental and lending rights has not been properly transposed into Irish law. When Ireland transposed the directive, it did not provide for a shared right. Under section 38 of the principal Act, prior to the introduction of this Bill, the producers of sound recordings were granted a monopoly over the collection of the single payment. Section 208 of that Act gave performers only a subsidiary right to claim an unspecified payment from the producers. The collection agency for sound recording owners, Phonographic Performance Ireland, PPI, entered into an agreement in 2003 for a lump sump to be paid to the representative body of the recording artists, based on the number of played tracks in any given year.”
“The point about all of this is that the actual allocation of equitable remuneration between the owner of the sound recording copyright and the artist performance copyright is something which needs to be solidly grounded in clearly understood principles. At this stage, it should be stated that there is very considerable dissatisfaction on the part of recording artists that they are not getting their fair share out of the equitable remuneration collected by licensing bodies for the use of sound recordings. In effect, the recording artists are driven towards a 25% share rather than a 50% share. Of course, it is the case that the sound recording interest and its copyright must be protected and that the recording artist must have their interest protected fairly as well.”
“Apart from its value in that regard, it is also necessary to insert it to help to fix a problem that arises in section 2(a) of the Bill, which proposes to insert a new section 208(3A) into the principal Act. This will be made clear in the next amendment.”
“I move amendment No. 1: “Amendment of section 38 of Principal Act 2. Section 38 of the Principal Act is amended by the insertion of the following subsection after subsection (3): “(3A) Payments made to a licensing body pursuant to subsections (1) and (2) of this section shall be known for the purpose of this section and section 208 as ‘equitable remuneration’. The right to receive the same is a right which is shared between the owner of the sound recording and performers whose performances are incorporated in the sound recording.”.”. This amendment proposes to amend section 38 of the principal Act, which is the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000. I will indicate to the House what this is intended to do. This simple amendment clarifies the nature of the right as a shared right in a single payment.”
“That is a hugely valuable industry in Ireland. The idea that one or two organisations can attempt to drive a man out of office is wholly unacceptable to me. I hope the Government has the courage and honesty to stand up for him and make it clear to those who are trying to get rid of him that their tactics will not work and are counterproductive.”