Now, there's been a lot of angst circulating about the recent recommendations that were made by the Productivity Commission, in regards to the Copyright Restrictions on the Parallel Importation of books.
Up until yesterday, I was utterly convinced that the recommendations were a Bad Thing. This was after seeing many writers blog on the issue, such as this post on Lili Wilkinson's blog, which I felt summed up the situation quite nicely.
Basically, if these restrictions were to be abolished, our local industry would be undercut by an international industry who can afford to sell them at cheaper prices and therefore put local publishers out of business. For local authors who rely on local publishers to produce their books, and don't have the profile / success to make it on an international stage, this creates a further barrier toward getting published. Furthermore, we wouldn't be able to read Australian versions of literature written by Australian authors. And, finally, cheaper books mean that authors don't get paid as much in royalties.
Now, I feel strongly about supporting the Australian literary industry. Yes, books cost money. However, in the scheme of things, books are better value for money than most forms of entertainment. We're talking about the equivalent cost of going out and having a meal. And if you can't afford that for books, we have public libraries, which will cost you nothing.
So, yesterday, I was a little surprised when I started seeing people in my social network making positive comments about the PC's recommendations, saying that this was a good thing. Who were these people? These people were librarians. And then I received an email from the Australian Library and Information Association - of whom I am a proud card-carrying member - drawing attention to the recommendations, and also highlighting ALIA's own recommendations which contributed to this result.
And so I had a look at ALIA's submission, and I was intrigued to find that ALIA supports the removal of restrictions on parallel importation, based on the following statements:
The restrictions are not needed in order to provide creators with further incentive to create and innovate.
The restrictions are not needed in order to provide local publishers with incentive to invest in creative endeavour.
The restrictions should be considered as a competition issue, and not a copyright issue.
Basically, the current issue is that, on an international market, Australian consumers are paying too much for books. This is creating an inequality, whereby books are more accessible to those who can (a) afford it, or (b) have the knowhow to get books from overseas. Consumers in Australia should be able to go to the bookstore and pay the same amount of money as consumers in the UK or the US.
And, speaking as a librarian who believes in social equality, social inclusion and accessibility to literature, this is an option that we need to seriously consider. The majority of literary culture in our society is from an international market. Australian literature aside, why should we be paying substantially more for international literature that is locally published when we can import a cheaper version?
So, my question is this: is there a way of opening up the market, and making books more accessible (ie. cheaper) without (a) compromising the creative integrity of Australian writers, and (b) putting our local industry out of business? Is it naive to think that overseas publishers will respect an international audience when exporting books to Australia (especially if they are exporting Australian literature INTO Australia?
One thing seems obvious - if we are to remove restrictions on parallel importation, then there also need to be new measures also brought in to protect our writers. We can't just pass this motion, and expect the other to follow, just because it's theoretically possible.
I'd be curious to hear what you think, writers and librarians (and publishers?) alike...
