Moral Right To Authorship Tied To Copyright

The Federal Court of Appeal has upheld a finding that the Royal Canadian Legion did not infringe an author's moral rights by selling poppy patterned puppies under allegedly false authorship information. In the early 2000s, Mr. French sold 150 000 toy stuffed dogs patterned with a poppy design to the Legion for re-sale. In 2020, Mr. French discovered the Legion still had a version of the puppy offered in their catalogue with a descriptor that the toy was "developed by the Legion." Mr. French sued the Legion for copyright and moral right infringement. Specifically, Mr. French claimed that authorship of the design was misattributed to the Legion.

In the first instance, the Federal Court found that the Legion was not liable for copyright infringement in view of section 64(2) of the Copyright Act. Section 64(2) sets out that once a useful article is mass produced (more than 50 copies), it is not copyright or moral right infringement to reproduce the article or to do