Sweden: Collective bargaining regarding copyright for staff journalists

In the ongoing negotiations on a new collective agreement betweeen the The Swedish Union of Journalists and the Swedish Newspaper Publishers Associations ( a collective agreement contains clauses on salaries, working hours, copyright etc ) which has going on since April this year, the Newspapers publishers have demanded broad acquisitions of copyrights:

1) a right for the employer to transfer electronic use in pressclipping services to third party,

2) a general right for the employer to transfer all kind of electronic uses to third party on the condition that the third parties use the trade mark of the employer in their services; and

3)a right for the employer to deliver material to a parent company and an unlimited number of subsidiary companies.

And the Newspaper publishers are unwilling to pay anything additionally for these acqusitions.

The demands are broad but also very vague, especially number 2 and 3. The Newspaper publishers have not been able to actually define what kind of use the employer should be able to transfer to the third parties, with the drafts the Newspaper publishers are proposing.

The Swedish Union of Journalists has also demands in other issues ( not copyright ) for improvements, but the Swedish Newspaper Publishers Association refuse to discuss any of these issues unless their demands on Copyright are agreed upon.

During the summer and the beginning of autumn the negotiations are adjourned but will commence again later, probably in October.