Broadcasting television programs in rehabilitation centre constitutes an act of “communication to the public” and entails payment to collecting societies

By judgment of 31 May 2016  The Court of Justice of the EU (case C 117/15), said that the operator of a rehabilitation centre who broadcasts protected works by installed television sets, intentionally broadcasts protected works to its patients. Therefore, such a broadcast constitutes an act of “communication to the public”. This means that operator of a rehabilitation centre, who installs television sets and broadcasts television programmes, has to obtain a license from the collecting society.