Screenrights welcomes the passing in the Senate today of the Copyright Amendment (Disability Access and Other Measures Act) 2017. As well as improving access to content for disabled people, the Act contains amendments to streamline and update the statutory licence for the copying and sharing of content for education in Australia.
Speaking in Sydney today, Screenrights Chief Executive Simon Lake said “the new version of the statutory licence will be vastly simplified and better suited to the digital environment.
It will reduce red-tape for teachers and administrators in the education sector and will introduce a principles-based approach to ensure the licence can adapt to technological change, while still safeguarding appropriate support for the creation of new resources for the education sector.”
Screenrights’ EnhanceTV online service for the education sector demonstrates how the Copyright Act provides flexibility and enables innovation in a changing technological environment by enabling easy access to curriculum-linked Australian broadcast content.
“We look forward to continuing to work in collaboration with our partners in the education sector to ensure educators can easily access and use the terrific content made by our Members,” Simon Lake said.
The changes to the statutory licence came from a proposal from stakeholders. Screenrights worked with Universities Australia with the National Copyright Unit on behalf of the schools sector and with Copyright Agency to develop a joint proposal to government. This followed a government invitation to the organisations to collaborate on a proposal as part of a recommendation by the Australian Law Reform Commission in its report on Copyright and the Digital Economy.
The Australian Copyright Council has published an information sheet on the Act can be accessed here.
