Copyright Review will be published by March

[silicon_toad2000]

http://delimiter.com.au/2014/01/13/copyright-review-will-published-march/

The ALRC’s inquiry was opened following the Internet piracy High Court case between content owners and Internet service provider iiNet. After the court judgement, which was broadly unfavourable to the film and TV studios which had brought the action, the then-Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft had argued the Government should take legislative action on the issue.

The ALRC subsequently separately released an issues paper and discussion paper on the issue to the public, receiving a huge number of submissions (860) on the issue from the public and conducting some 109 consultations with stakeholders. It also briefly opened a very limited public discussion forum on the issue.

On 29 November, the ALRC delivered the final report on the issue, Copyright and the Digital Economy, to the Attorney-General, as required by the terms of reference. The report will likely act as a landmark document which will help the Federal Government form policy on a wide range of matters with relation to copyright and intellectual property law — such as fair use provisions, re-broadcasting, Internet piracy and more.

However, new Attorney-General George Brandis has not committed to releasing the report publicly. In addition, Brandis has consistently, over a period of several years, refused to comment on Coalition policy on areas relating to intellectual property.

On 17 December, Delimiter sought access to the full Copyright and the Digital Economy report under Freedom of Information laws.

In a response issued last week (PDF), AGD acting assistant secretary Douglas Rutherford noted that he had decided to grant full access to the report. However, Rutherford added that he had decided to defer access to the document until close of business on Thursday, 27 February under certain provisions of the FOI Act.