On 15 April the Council (= EU Member States) APPROVED the copyright Directive at the Ministerial level at an Agriculture and Fisheries Council meeting in Luxembourg – see the overview below of how EU Member States voted.
- 6 Member States voted AGAINST: Finland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden
- 3 Member States abstained: Belgium, Estonia and Slovenia
- 19 Member States voted FOR – see below.
See the joint statement from Finland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland and the separate statements from Estonia and Germany here.
Article 17 (ex Art. 13) of the adopted text will force upload filters onto the Internet. The EU Member States will now have 2 years’ time to implement the Directive into their own national legislation. The fight continues, but now at national level. This copyright legislation is a Directive, which means that the EU Member States have some margin for manoeuvre at the national level with regards to how they ensure that the legislation will work in practice. Therefore, it will be important to convince national policymakers to ensure that they implement Article 17 (ex Art. 13) in the least harmful way, by ensuring the best possible protection of citizens’ fundamental rights.