Parliamentary questions raised about dominant position Buma/Stemra

Last month MP Verhoeven of the Dutch liberal democrates (D66) asked parliamentary questions to the secretary of Security and Justice about the functioning of the Dutch collecting society Buma/Stemra.  Now, the minister of Security of Justice, Opstelten, answered these questions. The parliamentary questions were raised in response to a couple of articles from a Dutch newspaper about Buma/Stemra.  Below you can read the summary of the most important issues derived from the parliamentary questions.

The parliamentary questions were raised because of the possible dominant position of Buma/Stemra in the music industry. Due to her statutory duty it’s possible that Buma can be considered as a monopoly. Concerns are raised by the Dutch liberal democrats that musicians, who want to claim their rights, don’t have a choice but to use the services of Buma/Stemra.

According to Opstelten, Buma/Stemra has a dominant position in the music industry. Article 30a of the Dutch Copyright Act demands the minister of Justice’s consent if an organization want to mediate in music copyright. Up till now, only Buma got the permission from the minister.   

On behalf of the musicians, Buma provides third parties licenses for broadcasting the music in radio- and television shows and music performances in public. Nevertheless, musicians aren’t obligated to let Buma carry out their licenses, as the musicians can do this themselves. However, they are not able to hire any other organization than Buma to do this for them.

Because there isn’t a competitive market of collective management organizations, monitoring Buma/Stemra is necessary. Monitoring the organization is necessary so transparency and efficiency can be guaranteed to the copyright holders. Therefore, the Dutch Copyright Monitoring Board (in Dutch: College van Toezicht Auteursrechten) monitors Buma/Stemra.  
Recently, the general assembly of Buma accepted the motion to restructure their management fundamentally. The Copyright Monitoring Board will keep an eye on the developments of Buma. An annotation of the Copyright Monitoring Board was the reason for ‘Voice', the branch organization for collective management organizations, to make the guidelines ‘Good Management and Integrity CMO’s' (collective management organizations). These guidelines are part of the CMO trademark. Voice introduced this trademark and an individual certifying organization will be carrying it out this fall.

Now, Buma/Stemra is restructuring their management, which could be beneficial to get a CMO trademark for ‘good management and integrity’. This fall will be announced if Buma/Stemra will receive the CMO trademark. Nevertheless, the real question is if restructuring the management and possibly getting the CMO trademark will take away Buma’s dominant (monopoly) position. Perhaps it would be a good idea to create more competition in the music licenses market, so there won’t be a dominant position for Buma/Stemra.

References: ieforum.nl en overheid.nl

By: Karen Groen