In early December British recording artists lost their three year battle to have their performing royalties extended from 50 years to 95 years in line with the States. British singer Sir Cliff Richard has been leading the campaign with support from leading musicians like Bono.
Under current rules Sir Cliff’s first big hit Move It, recorded in 1958, will be out of copyright in less than two years - which will allow record companies to sell copies of the song without paying him royalties. Some of The Beatles’ earliest hits including A Hard Days Night and Can’t Buy Me Love will be out of copyright in 2014.
Despite Sir Cliff’s high profile campaign, pointing out the royalties amount to a pension for many artists, and the backing of EMI Chairman Eric Nicoli who made a direct plea to the government in November 2006 on behalf of the campaigners, the British Government has decided to lead the time period unchanged at 50 years. Nicoli said that keeping the 50-year terms "would put the UK at a disadvantage and jeopardise future investment."
Unsurprisingly Nicoli’s altruistic stand was not supported by the rest of the recording industry who stand to benefit from the sale of out of copyright recordings. Universal was one of the companies opposed to the change and lobbied the independent reviewer, Andrew Gowers . on the importance of introducing new acts over safeguarding royalties from older ones.
Probably the decisive factor was that even if the artists and record groups had convinced Mr Gowers to recommend extending the copyright period, the UK Government would have faced legal challenges for breaking with European Union Law that binds all member states to the 50-year period.
On 7th December 2006 the stars fought back when the campaigners took out a full page advertisement in the Financial Times of London.
Bon0 and Richards were joined by Paul McCartney and Robbie Williams in a last-ditch appeal for an extension to copyright on their recordings. "We call upon the UK government to support the extension of copyright in sound recordings," they said in their appeal
The advert was said to have been placed on behalf of more than 3,500 record companies and 40,000 performers.
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