EVENT INVITATION

The new Copyright legislation: Making the most for next generation authors

Join us on 25 November to hear directly from filmmakers about the struggles they face in the pandemic era with reactions from the European Parliament, Member States representatives and experts. They will discuss how to make the most of the new Copyright legislation and enable next generation filmmakers to recover, grow, and re-create European audiovisual culture. Register here.

The event will be moderated by Samuel Stolton, Digital Affairs Reporter at EURACTIV. 

Guests

Adriana Moscoso del Prado Hernández, Director of Cultural Industries, Intellectual Property and Cooperation, Ministry of Culture, Spain
Helga Trüpel, former Member of the European Parliament (Greens/Germany)
Jochem Donker, General Counsel, LIRA (SAA member), The Netherlands
Alexis Georgoulis, Member of the European Parliament (GUE/Greece)

Video messages

Filmmakers and SAA Patrons: Urša Menart (Slovenia), Julie Bertuccelli (France) and Roger Michell (UK)
The European Parliament’s Cultural and Creators Friendship Group

 ADVOCACY

Funding for cultural and creative sectors in time of crisis 

More than ever, Europe’s cultural and creative sectors have come together to influence the next EU budget for 2021-2027, its COVID-19 Recovery Fund and Member States national recovery and resilience plans. The SAA has been part of many joint initiatives:

In June, European associations sent an open letter “Investing in Europe’s next generation by investing in culture” and organised a letter signed by 45 leading authors and artists. Disappointingly, Heads of State and government decided to preserve the Creative Europe programme with no additional money in their July agreement on the 2021-27 Financial Framework and Recovery Fund. However, the European Parliament continued calling for a doubling of the Creative Europe programme and reached a compromise with the Council on 10 November bringing an additional €600 million to the programme, an increase of a third of its budget to €2,2 billion for 2021-2027.

In September, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on the cultural recovery of Europe calling the European Commission and Member States to earmark at least 2% of the Recovery Funds to the cultural and creative sectors. In a letter to the Commission and Member States, more than 100 cultural organisations referred to the Parliament’s call for 2% to be earmarked and the need for Member States to integrate culture in their national recovery plans. Our eyes remain on Member States as they are now tackling the second wave of the pandemic outbreak and are witnessing tightened lockdown measures. 

 ADVOCACY

Authors need the Copyright Directive implemented, now! 

 In July, the SAA sent letters to EU Ministers in charge of copyright, reminding them that implementing the EU Copyright Directive is urgent and a unique opportunity to pay special attention to authors and strengthen them out of the COVID-19 crisis. Article 18 provides that Member States shall ensure that authors receive appropriate and proportionate remuneration for the exploitation of their works. Receiving royalties for the exploitation of audiovisual works by on-demand platforms should be an essential income for screenwriters and directors in this time of crisis when projects and shootings are being delayed or cancelled for an unforeseen period.

 CONSULTATIONS BY THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION