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Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 16 Jul 1958

Vol. 49 No. 9

Industrial and Commercial Property (Protection) (Amendment) Bill, 1958.—Second and Subsequent Stages.

Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

This Bill is introduced for the purpose of bringing our copyright law, as regards the translation of works, into line with our obligations under the Berne Copyright Convention. The convention, which dates from 1886 and to which we first acceded in 1927, lays down certain principles of copyright which are incorporated into the domestic laws of the participating states. For example, works must be given protection without requiring the authors to register such works, and they must be protected for the author's life and 50 years after his death.

Copyright includes the right to make or authorise any translation of the work. In the early conventions of the Berne Union, there was a provision which permitted a member state to make a reservation to its acceptance of the convention so as to curtail in its own domestic law, an author's right over translations of his works. The reason for this was to enable countries which were largely dependent on translations of foreign works, in order to supply a literature of scientific or purely literary works in their own languages, to authorise such translations compulsorily if the original authors had not themselves done so. The actual provision was that if an author had not made or authorised a translation into the language of another state within ten years of the publication of the original work, that state could provide by law that the author's right in that respect thereupon ceased.

When we acceded to the Berne Convention in 1927, we made such a reservation to the convention in respect of translations into the Irish language, and Section 10 of the 1929 Act was enacted for this purpose. It provided that if an author of any work that was published in a country of the Berne Union did not make or cause to be made a translation of the work into Irish within ten years of the first publication, then his rights over translation into Irish ceased. That meant that after that time any person could translate such a work into Irish without any obligation to make any payment to the author.

In 1952 another convention distinct from the Berne Copyright Convention was drawn up at Geneva under the auspices of UNESCO, bringing into a reciprocal copyright agreement a number of countries, including the United States of America, which were not members of the Berne Union. The necessity for a separate convention arises from the fact that some of these states protected copyright for a shorter term than is required by the Berne Convention and also had systems requiring registration and local printing for the subsistence of copyright.

We participated in that new convention, known as the Universal Copyright Convention, and we propose to ratify it. An important feature of the new convention is that countries which have systems requiring registration and printing within their territories before copyright can be claimed, will now regard these requirements as fulfilled by nationals of other participating states and works published in such states, if they make claim to copyright by having copies marked with the prescribed symbol C in a circle, accompanied by the year of publication and the name of the copyright proprietor. This will be of advantage to our authors and publishers who may sell on the American market, and have hitherto been obliged to meet the requirements of American domestic law.

The Geneva Convention, like the early Berne Conventions, also makes a qualification about translations of copyright works. It provides that any contracting state may legislate to limit a foreign author's rights over the translation of his work into the language or languages of that state. In this case, the state may authorise the grant of licences for the compulsory translation of works after seven years, but only where the author refuses permission for such translations, or cannot be found, and only on condition that equitable remuneration is paid to the owner of the copyright.

Section 8 of the Act that was passed last year was designed to deal with the new situation regarding the compulsory translation of foreign works into Irish. That section set up a licensing system for translations on the lines of the provisions of the Geneva Convention, the licences to be subject to such terms and conditions as might be imposed, and obtainable after seven years from publication. It has now been represented to us that that provision is in conflict with our existing obligations under the Berne Copyright Convention, which, as I stated earlier, provided that authors' rights over translations should not be curtailed for ten years, and only by countries which originally made a reservation to that effect.

We must, in any event, rectify that position and bring our law into conformity with our obligations. It will be realised from what I have said that if we are to retain provisions in our law for compulsory translation of foreign works into Irish, two separate codes will have to be incorporated; one to provide for free translation after ten years of works published in the Berne Union countries, and the other to provide for translations after 7 years under licence and with payment to the author, of works published in or by nationals of countries in the Universal Copyright Convention, the Geneva Convention. It would be a situation that would be difficult to administer, and confusing for authors and translators alike. I might illustrate that by the case of a book published in English simultaneously in New York and London. The United States is a member of the Universal Copyright Convention, and Britain is a party to both conventions. At what point and under what conditions such a book could be compulsorily translated into Irish would be a very contentious question.

We have reviewed the whole case for having any provision in our law for compulsory translation. I have said that our copyright law and the laws of the other members of the Berne Union recognise copyright as having, basically, a duration of the author's life and 50 years after his death. Only the strongest reasons could warrant the curtailment of part of that right to a period of ten years from publication. The experience of the Department of Education during the time in which that limitation has existed in our law, has been that no difficulty arose in coming to suitable arrangements with foreign authors for the translation into Irish of any works required for that purpose. It has not been found necessary in the whole period of 30 years to invoke that compulsion clause, and no reason is seen for its continuance in our legislation.

Section 2 of this Bill, therefore, will remove that curtailment of authors' rights. It restates the principle of copyright in that regard, that it includes the right to produce, reproduce, perform or publish any translation. A saver is being provided to meet the possibility of any Irish translation of a copyright work having been lawfully made before this Bill comes into operation. If such a translation, already made, is published within three years of the commencement of this Act, it will not infringe the author's copyright.

Some other minor amendments are also being made at Section 3, requiring mention of an author's name when quotations from a copyright work are included in reviews in newspapers or magazines, or when extracts from a copyright work are included in school anthologies. These are being made at the moment because they are required by the terms of the latest revision of the Berne Convention made in Brussels in 1948. We propose to ratify that revised convention as well as the Universal Copyright Convention.

The present Bill is a limited measure to deal with the question of translation of copyright works, so as to bring our law into line with our existing international obligations. It is I think pertinent to say now that our copyright law as a whole requires quite considerable amendment and modernisation, and it is intended to submit proposals for that purpose to the Oireachtas in due course. Our basic copyright law dates from 1927, and it is not designed to deal satisfactorily with the developments in the dissemination of literary, musical and dramatic works such as have occurred since that time. Broadcasting, television, sound recordings, film sound tracks, and so on have become very important mediums for the performance of literary and musical works. Not only may the works themselves be copyright but the means by which they are performed may have a claim to copyright protection. Some of these things are already covered by our law in a way which does not cater for the technical developments that have taken place. There is also the question of providing some form of protection for artists against the unauthorised recording or filming of their performances. It is a very complex subject, and before submitting these wider proposals for the amendment and modernisation of our law I wish to ascertain and consider the views of all groups and persons whose interests touch on the question of copyright in any way.

Outside the question of copyright, the present Bill deals with a matter relating to court actions on patents and trade marks. As the definitions in the 1927 Act stand, rules of court in proceedings relating to patents and trade marks could be made by the Minister. The Superior Courts Rules Committee have represented that it is undesirable that rules of court should be made otherwise than by the courts themselves, and the definitions are being amended to enable that to be done.

I think the Minister has made an excellent case for this Bill. It is welcome news that our whole copyright law is to be revised, because since 1927, as the Minister has pointed out, there have been developments which made a considerable amount of that law, even at that date, archaic. It is also, I think, a good thing to see us passing legislation to fulfil international agreements because it is desirable that such matters as patents and copyrights should be in international agreements. Even if on occasion it might prove that our subscription to these agreements necessitates our passing something rather irksome to ourselves, I think the principle that there should be international agreements is a very good one.

With regard to the matter of patents and rules of court upon which the Minister concluded, I have no knowledge at all, but with regard to the other matter of copyright and translation, I think the measure is a good one because in this country—it is a small country—our reading public is not sufficient to make publishing, particularly publishing of a certain kind, a sound commercial proposition at all.

With regard to the Irish language, we must necessarily depend upon translations if efforts to bring that language up to date are to have any success at all. The measure, therefore, is a desirable one and I wish it Godspeed.

There was one crucial sentence in the Minister's opening remarks. Unfortunately, I did not quite hear what he said. Did he say: "We proposed"—past tense—"to ratify the Universal Copyright Convention" or did he say "we propose"?

We propose to do it.

Thank you. A good deal turns on that. I should like, then, to say a word or two on the need for speedy ratification of this convention. I know from direct experience that last summer an Irish Dublin publisher went to America with a book written by an Irish author and published and produced in Ireland. Owing to the fact that this convention was not ratified at that time, he experienced great difficulty in meeting the most encouragingly heavy demand for that Irish book in the United States of America. Some of us got in touch with the Ministry, and I understand that steps were taken to help him.

I would urge the Minister to ratify that convention as soon as he possibly can. There is some risk that a similar situation might arise again. Irish publishers are enterprising and are doing their best to stimulate exports. It would be a very great pity if they were handicapped in any way like this.

This Bill will be welcomed as a forward step by Irish authors and artists, as well as by publishers and booksellers. I think that the authors will particularly welcome the clause demanding the insertion of the authors' names where they are quoted. It is sometimes very unfair when quotations are used without any acknowledgment whatever. I would urge upon the Minister to proceed as quickly as he can with the improvement of the existing copyright law. A good deal depends upon this—the livelihood of the authors, and the livelihood of publishers, to some extent.

We complain here sometimes that production in this country does not give bigger dividends. We sometimes neglect the fact that our authors' brains and our publishers' enterprise can be quite useful assets in the country's economy. I think it would be an encouragement to them if the Minister proceeded quickly to help them with an improvement of the copyright law. I am sure that, in doing so, he will consult such bodies as the authors organised in the Irish Academy of Letters and, perhaps, the P.E.N. Club.

The authors' point of view is very important. Potentially, they are a most valuable source of income. I think it is particularly sad that so many of our Irish authors, including one or two in this House, have had to have their books published in England because the particular conditions in Ireland would make it considerably disadvantageous from a financial point of view, if they published them in Ireland. If the Minister and his Department would apply themselves to that problem and make it possible for Irish authors to publish their books entirely in Ireland, he could see a quarter of a million pounds or, perhaps, half a million pounds coming into this country, which do not come into it at present.

If a man like George Bernard Shaw had had his works published in Ireland, the sum would have reached the order of perhaps, £2,000,000 coming into this country. We have no author quite so prolific at the moment. But I think this invisible loss of income to the nation should not be neglected. But of course I should very greatly regret it if the Minister thought of taking any steps to discourage—rather than to encourage—the publication of so many books in England. Instead I hope the time will come when our authors can proudly have their books published in Ireland and produced in Ireland.

In connection with that, very briefly I should like to touch on one other point, as the Minister is here. The Government have granted relaxation of income-tax to various kinds of industrial and other products going to the United States of America. Very briefly, may I ask him to consider the possibility of relaxation of income-tax to Irish authors who have their works published in American journals, newspapers, and so on? Quite a number are doing so. They are exporting the products of their brains.

We are going outside the question of copyright.

I am sorry. I realise that. I would ask the Minister if he could ever get round to promoting this. It would be greatly appreciated by authors. For the past 1,500 years, the authors of this country have served the country well at home and abroad.

It is intended that the Geneva Universal Copyright Convention will be ratified without further delay and it will come into operation within three months from the lodgment of our instrument of application. With regard to the prospective further review and amendment of our copyright law, it is fair to point out that in so far as printed works are concerned the enactment of this measure and the implementation of the international agreements bring things up to date, as far as our law is concerned. The extension is really required to cover productions other than printed which are of a more modern kind and which our law does not touch at all. As regards the question of income-tax, the Minister for Finance will be here to-morrow.

Question put and agreed to.
Agreed to take remaining stages to-day.
Bill put through Committee, reported without amendment, received for final consideration and passed.
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