OneMusic Australia: Dance venues invited to comment on new licensing proposal

Venues playing recorded music for the purpose of dancing have been invited to provide feedback on an initial OneMusic Australia licence proposal by 27 November.

OneMusic Australia is a joint venture between APRA AMCOS and PPCA. The initiative is aimed at simplifying a business’ administration of their annual music licensing.

APRA AMCOS says a OneMusic licence could be the simplest way for a business to cover its legal obligations under the Copyright Act.

The world’s first music licence scheme to merge – it also covers musical works and recorded music in one agreement - and launched in NZ three years ago.

Like OneMusic NZ, the Australian initiative will cover practically all Australian and International musical and recorded songs. A licence from OneMusic is a licence to play music from all countries, not just Australia.

PPCA general mnanager, Lynne Small said, “This is the first dance venue proposal. There is time for healthy debate from industry and artists.

"It is up to the industry to present us with alternatives and OneMusic Australia will consider that against the rights of our members and licensors to be fairly remunerated ahead of launch late next year.”

The proposed scheme sees fees based on venue capacity, consistent with the current approach of PPCA.

If a venue operates at varying actual capacities on different nights of the week, that is taken into account: for example, if a two level club operates only one level on a Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, their fee on those nights will be based on the lower ‘one level’ capacity, not the full capacity of the club. If a venue with a capacity of 100 sees 500 people come and go in a night they are still only charged at the 100 capacity rate.

APRA AMCOS’ head of revenue and licensing Richard Mallett said they had run the numbers on a range of real-life dance venue scenarios.

"The result was an average saving of 3.8 percent for venues currently licensed under both APRA AMCOS’ and PPCA’s current schemes,” he says.

“This week, media outlets published information that was grossly incorrect. The example given was a dance venue with a capacity of 500 people trading six days a week, every week of the year.

"Even if such a venue existed in Australia, under the current two licences, and based on an 85 percent attendance rate, they would be currently paying a total of $320,813. Under OneMusic Australia’s initial proposal, this venue would see a reduction of $24,413, to $296,400." 

Feedback on proposals are invited online and the consultation papers can be accessed here.