Liberal government fills last two vacancies on Copyright Board

The federal government has named two new members to the Copyright Board of Canada, a move that fills the last vacancies on the board and comes alongside Ottawa introducing new board reform measures. Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains announced Wednesday that Katherine Braun and René Côté will serve on the board on as part-time members on four-year terms, starting immediately. Bains said in a statement the two will “help usher in a modernized Copyright Board of Canada.” Braun is an economist from St. Albert, Alberta, and has spent the last decade working with the United Nations on international development projects. According to her LinkedIn profile, she spent more than a decade at the Alberta government working as an executive director at the department of energy, following eight years in Ontario as a labour market economist. René Côté is a professor of law at the Université du Québec, specializing in technology and intellectual property law, where he has worked for the last three decades. In September, the Liberal government also appointed Adriane Porcin, of Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Nathalie Théberge of Gatineau, Quebec to positions on the five-member, quasi-judicial board that sets copyright terms and rates. The last of the board’s appointments come as two House of Commons committees conduct a statutory review of the Copyright Act – both of which have specific ministerial instructions to examine enforcement of board-set rates, especially when it comes to educational copying. The Liberal government also introduced new copyright measures in its second budget implementation bill, which was tabled last week and is now working its way through committee stage. Bill C-86, the recently-introduced 850-page omnibus budget implementation bill, brings in a number of changes, including new rules to the notice-and-notice regime that prevent settlement demands – a measure aimed at preventing abuse of the notice system – and additional measures aimed at speeding-up board proceedings, such as a case management system. The board has faced longstanding complaints of structural delays in setting tariffs, a problem that’s plagued rights-holders and users and prompted numerous calls for reform. David Lametti, parliamentary secretary to the Innovation minister, said in the House this week that the 2018 budget included a 30 per cent boost to the board’s financial resources, and combine with the new legislative measures, that will “ensure that the board can once again issue the timely, forward-looking decisions.”

Liberal government fills last two vacancies on Copyright Board

Brief | November 7, 2018

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Liberal government fills last two vacancies on Copyright Board

Brief | November 7, 2018

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