Music Publishers Canada’s CEO Margaret McGuffin testifies before Senate of Canada 's Standing Committee on Transport and Communications
On April 22, Margaret McGuffin (CEO of Music Publishers Canada) appeared before the Senate of Canada's Standing Committee on Transport and Communications to discuss the opportunities and challenges artificial intelligence presents for Canada’s creative industries.
Her message was clear: while AI presents real opportunities to support creators, drive innovation, and expand Canada’s global cultural reach, it must be built on a foundation that respects copyright. Canada must not weaken its copyright framework through a Text and Data Mining exception. Music rights holders must retain control and be fairly compensated when their work is used to train AI models.
It is imperative that Canada approach generative AI in a manner that respects creators and incentivizes human expression. Doing so will not only support creators but also strengthen Canada’s creative economy.
Opening remarks to the Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications to discuss opportunities and challenges of artificial intelligence (AI)
By Margaret McGuffin, CEO of Music Publishers of Canada
Delivered on Wednesday, April 22, at 6:45 p.m. ET
Scene-setting / introduction
Good evening, Chair and members of the Committee. My name is Margaret McGuffin, and I am the CEO of Music Publishers Canada. I am here to discuss the need for the ethical and transparent development of AI models as Canada embraces the opportunity of AI.
Music publishers discover and develop Canadian songwriters and have made significant investments in the songs and scores that are heard every day on radio, on streaming services, in video games, in film and television productions and on new emerging platforms around the world.
Music publishers, composers and songwriters are already using AI tools (both in the studio and across their businesses) to unlock new efficiencies and scale their operations in an increasingly competitive global market. AI has the potential to support the work of human creators while also strengthening Canada’s cultural output and creative economy.
AI violation of copyrighted materials
Unfortunately, the music industry has also experienced the mass theft of copyrightprotected songs by AI companies, both on the input side — for the purpose of training AI models — and on the output side — the development and publication of unlicensed generative AI models. This poses serious risks for Canada’s creators and the companies that invest in them.
Strong copyright ensures that MPC’s members, songwriters and composers retain control over their work and are fairly compensated for its use.
When an AI company trains its models on scraped music without permission, rights holders lose both control and the ability to realize value from their works. The commercialization of these models is already creating market distortions and raising concerns about fair competition. This means Canadian songs are being used – without consent or compensation – to train an AI model that then generates new songs that replicate a creator’s distinctive sound, style, and creative identity, effectively stealing their intellectual property.
MPC works with the International Confederation of Music Publishers. Evidence collected by ICMP over the past three years has shown that many of the world’s biggest tech companies have scraped copyright-protected music—created by millions of songwriters, composers, and artists—to train generative AI systems without permission or licensing. To put it in perspective, nearly every song ever written by a Canadian songwriter has already been scraped and stolen by these AI companies without consent, credit or compensation.
The music publishing industry routinely grants licences to technology companies. AI developers should be no different. The emerging market for licensing music to AI developers should be encouraged, including by requiring AI companies to disclose and maintain records of all their training data.
Solutions: How should Canada proceed
So, how should Canada proceed? The Canadian government must reject any calls for watering down a copyright system with a Text and Data Mining copyright exception. The Australian government made the announcement that they will not implement a TDM exception in December and the UK government recently stated that a TDM exception is no longer their preferred pathway.
It is imperative that Canada approach generative AI in a manner that respects creators and incentivizes human expression. Doing so will not only support creators but also strengthen Canada’s creative economy. This will benefit not just creators, but Canadians as a whole. I look forward to answering any of your questions.