The amount the provinces are trying to recover in this latest suit amounts to a rounding error in a country that spends more than $50 billion (CAD) annually on K-12 education, but is significant to a cultural industry that operates on slim margins, and would go a long way to fuel investment in Canadian learning resources.
Indeed, the status of tariffs certified by the Copyright Board, which is at the heart of this dispute, is a question that was examined by the Federal Court of Canada in Access Copyright v. York University, along with the legality of York’s copying guidelines. And in a clear and carefully considered 2017 decision, the Court determined that the guidelines do not “withstand the application of the two-part test laid down by the Supreme Court of Canada,” and that “there is no opting out” of tariffs approved by the Copyright Board.
Given that the copying guidelines adopted by Ministries of Education are virtually identical to those scrutinized during the York trial, and that approved tariffs are in place for the period outlined in the suit, the legal action appears both aggressive and frivolous, intended to deplete the already limited resources of a vital cultural sector.
Not surprisingly, the education sector has appealed the York decision. What is surprising, however, are these new lawsuits being filed during the lead up to that appeal.
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