The Monday Muse is a back after a hiatus and this week we’re doing something slightly different. A few weeks ago, several of us had an email conversation about the parallel importation of books in Australia. What follows is a slightly edited and tidied up version of that conversation.

But first, what is parallel importation? There is a lot of information on the Productivity Commission’s website, but here’s a good basic summary of the issues:

When a bookshop imports copies of a book published overseas that are also available from an Australian publisher, this is parallel importing. Parallel importing (in theory if not always in practice) gives customers cheaper books and a greater range of titles. On the other hand, parallel imports make it much harder for local publishers to survive and this reduces the support available to local authors in the early stages of their careers. Australia has a fascinating (and in my opinion eminently practical) compromise: parallel imports are allowed if a book is published overseas and no Australian publisher issues a local edition within 30 days. This may be about to change. [Garth Nix, Nick Earls against parallel imports, Talking Squid]

It seems that there is no consensus amongst Australian librarians about this issue. On the one hand, peak bodies such as ALIA, CAUL and National and State Libraries Australasia support lifting the restrictions. On the other hand, other bodies such as the Australian School Library Association and Public Libraries, New South Wales – Country Association wrote submissions against lifting the parallel importation restrictions

Onto the conversation about this…

Morgan: I’ve been aware of the debate about the parallel importation provisions concerning books in the Australian Copyright Act for only a little while. Several weeks ago, there was some interesting discussion in the WAIN list about this. ALIA has made a submission for lifting the restrictions on the parallel importation of books, which should reduce increase competition and reduce the price of books in Australia.

It seems that on this issue, ALIA has the same bottom line position as the big retailers, including Coles, Woolworths, K-Mart and Dymocks and is on the other side of the fence from Australian authors and publishers.

Maybe it makes no sense for these cultural protections to be in the Copyright Act, as ALIA mentions. Under most circumstances, I’d be happy to see any scaling back of the Copyright Act. But this isn’t really a debate about IP. ALIA tries to respond to the argument that these changes will hurt the Australian publishing industry by stating that the New Zealand publishing industry had not been hurt by similar changes in NZ. But that didn’t sound too convincing, especially after I read the submissions from the NZ publishers and authors, stating that the changes there had hurt the NZ industry.

I think it’s an interesting topic because both sides have validity. Why should Australians pay significantly more for books – how does this impact libraries and readers? On the other hand, if these changes hurt the Australian publishing industry, who will identify and support Australian voices?

Con: This would be an interesting topic! Can I admit now that I haven’t made up my mind on this yet??

Morgan: My mind isn’t totally made up on this either. I am leaning towards the “no” side, but I’m willing to be convinced.
Looking at ALIA’s full submission, this point does seem reasonable:

International publishers continue to be significant beneficiaries of the current restrictions, as the subsidiaries or branch offices of international publishers in Australia can take advantage of a distribution monopoly that prevents retailers from sourcing cheaper books from overseas.

Protectionist policy is a blunt tool for providing incentives for local publishers, and we strongly agree with the position outlined in the Issues Paper:

[I]f the government has the objective of assisting Australian book producers (whether authors, publishers or printers), direct subsidies or other policy instruments could achieve this objective at less cost to the community than is associated with parallel importation provisions.

So the debate isn’t so clear cut as small independent Aussie publishers versus those money grubbing multinationals.

On the other hand, if they did ease the restrictions on parallel importation, I am extremely skeptical that any government would ever introduce direct subsidies to independent Australian publishers which they contemplate in the last paragraph.

Kathryn: If it is the PI rights that restrict other media of the work from being distributed in a market, then I am totally against. It is impossible to legally obtain electronic copies of many books, and people who want to read them are forced to resort to Other Methods.

snail: I have so far written a 3-4 paragraph post for my blog on related matters. ie how I’m buying more and more books via amazon, etc because I can get them for half of what I can locally.

Richard Flanagan wrote a good article in the weekend SMH [link, also published here - the remarks on PI start on page 3 of the pdf], arguing against the changes in terms of what they mean for local authors. I see his point but feel the argument is somewhat lost already by the reality of the net especially when we now have things such as:

http://www.booko.com.au
which makes it way easy to do all the cross country comparisons I was doing manually prior. Have ISBN, will find

I recently read an interview with a Spanish writer, Zafon, which rather impressed me. The local shops only had the paperback of his previous novel, The Shadow of the Wind. I hooked into booko and found a limited edition (1000 copies, nicely bound (fine paper, deluxe cloth, sewn binding), and signed) via Amazon US which was 40% off (now 37% off) and will cost me about AUD$71 including delivery.

I can’t source that locally. There’s a bunch of stuff that I can get for half of what it costs locally and don’t get me started on the OED pricing.

The Australian bookbuying market is being gouged royally, and mostly by the English publishers. The proposed changes seem to be swinging the pendulum from the English publishers to the US publishers.

Michelle: Very good topic and as I am also sitting on the fence, I would love to see the arguments and hopefully the comments that will come with it, before I decide for myself.

Corey: Here’s an article which outlines another facet of the issue:

Damn Publishers
By Melissa Gregg
The Excellence in Research for Australia initiative will make publishing outcomes more important than ever. But present indicators of academic merit appear poised to punish Australian research for its very Australian-ness.

Essentially it is arguing that:
- The research is Australian focused and yet the Australian publishers won’t publish it as they focus on text books
- The international publishers won’t publish it because it has an Australian focus.

It occured to me that perhaps this is a sign of a monopolistic market in that the Australian publishers can afford to be picky about this because they’ve all got the same sorts of policies.

Fiona: Good point Corey!

It’s been a long time since I thought about this issue and I can’t remember the main points, but it struck me as being similar to the dual importation of CDs argument which ended up being a non-starter because people didn’t like buying inferior, cheap CDs in the end so they weren’t widely sold.

I’d be interested in the quality viewpoint of this – is it better to have books produced more cheaply in a country that can, for example, ramp up green printing facilities, or maintain Australian employment? I know that when I buy books I like to check and see where they were printed and I won’t buy expensive paperbacks if they were printed overseas or the binding is flimsy.