Roll over, Beethoven

My client is a UK-based music company (M) which owns both recordings (as a record label) and compositions (as a music publisher).

When music is played on radio or TV the rights-holders are entitled to public performance royalties which are collected and then distributed under collective licensing agreements.

In Germany that is done by GEMA. As rights-holder M registers music with GEMA in order to receive its share of those public performance royalties the amount of which depends on how often the music has been played on German radio and TV.

Those royalties may be subject to a withholding tax but M applied for an exemption under the double taxation treaty between Germany and the UK.

In response the German tax office sent M a lengthy questionnaire relating to the new “anti-treaty shopping” rules that came into effect in Germany in January...