Getting Paid Through PLR

Peter Schneider is the Manager of the Public Lending Right Program at the Canada Council for the Arts. He is also the Executive Secretary to the PLR Commission. The PLR Commission is a permanent advisory body composed of authors, translators, publishers, and librarians responsible for the high-level oversight and direction of the PLR Program. The PLR Commission maintains the eligibility criteria and methodology for the PLR Program. The PLR Program has been in continuous operation since 1986, and provides annual compensation to authors, translators, illustrators, photographers, and audiobook narrators in recognition of the availability of their work in public library collections across Canada.

Chair of the PLR Commission, Russell Wangersky is a writer, editor, and columnist. His latest book, Same Ground: Chasing Family Down the California Gold Rush Trail, was released in Fall 2022. His eight books also include the memoir Burning Down the House: Fighting Fires and Losing Myself, a memoir of his eight years as a volunteer firefighter, two novels (The Glass Harmonica and Walt), and three short story collections, Whirl Away, The Hour of Bad Decisions, and The Path of Most Resistance. After more than 30 years in St. John's, NL, he moved to Saskatoon, where he has served as Editor-in-Chief of the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix. He is a seven-time National Newspaper Awards finalist and a Scotiabank-Giller finalist and is now Comment Editor at the Winnipeg Free Press.

John Degen is Chief Executive Officer of The Writers’ Union of Canada (TWUC), and Chair of the International Authors Forum (IAF) in the UK — serving and representing over 700,000 authors worldwide. He is a poet and novelist with three published books. John has worked for many years as an arts administrator, arts funder, and policy advocate on cultural issues. He previously held the position of Literature Officer at the Ontario Arts Council, where he administered funding for Ontario’s writers, publishers, and literary presenters, and was active in expanding the granting reach for that office into Ontario’s northern and Indigenous communities. His essays and opinions have been published widely throughout Canada, including in The Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, THIS Magazine, The Hill Times, Canadian Notes and Queries, and the Literary Review of Canada. He has served on many boards and advisories in the literary and arts sector. His debut novel, The Uninvited Guest, was shortlisted for the 2006 Amazon.ca First Novel Award.