26 March 2019
MEPs have voted to approve the EU Copyright Directive by 348 votes to 274. The legislation must now be implemented by individual member states.
Nicola Solomon, Chief Executive of the Society of Authors, said:
"This is excellent news for authors and other creators across Europe. The Directive will modernise copyright law for the digital age and ensure that creators are properly remunerated when their work is used online. It will also benefit creators by introducing new transparency obligations for publishers and other users, by introducing bestseller clauses and by enabling reversion of rights which are not being exploited.
"It has taken us many years to get to this stage, and we have had to compete against a well-funded lobbying effort from US tech giants. The new legislation is a victory for creators and users alike.
"We now look forward to working closely with government and the wider industry to ensure that the Directive is implemented in full in the UK."
You can read more about the Copyright Directive here.