Closed petition Decrease the UK's copyright term length to 50 years after the creator's death

Closed on 10 March 2021

Reduce the period for which works are protected by copyright, from 70 years after the creator's death, to 50, as it was before the 1995 Amendment to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This would expand the public domain, encourage innovation, and allow access to unpublished works.

In the US, EU, and the UK, copyright expires 70 years after the creator dies. This is 20 years longer than is required by the Berne Convention, and we believe is bad for innovation: publishers can endlessly re-release a dead author's work, whilst new creators are turned away for lack of demand. Were this petition to succeed, unpublished works could be rediscovered by a new generation, living British creators should benefit, and the British film industry could also benefit from this trove of new storylines.