Guernsey hopes to have ground-breaking new Image Rights legislation by the end of the year

In a celebrity-obsessed world, the commercial exploitation of a person’s image has never been more commercially valuable.  David Beckham undoubtedly nowadays earns more from commercialising the enormously powerful “Brand Beckham” than he earns on the pitch, and he is but one of a growing band of sportsmen, musicians and actors who have built an income stream from a personal brand which can be expected to subsist long after their initial careers may have ended.

Over the years, individual countries have tweaked their IP laws to try to protect an individual’s image, but still no legislation currently exists anywhere in the world that is exclusively drafted for the protection of all aspects of someone’s personal brand. But that is about to change.  Guernsey has identified the gap and is bringing forward legislation specifically for the registration and protection of “Image Rights”, establishing the world’s first Image Rights Register.  Although the process of crafting the new law has been a long drawn out process, there is now an expectation that it will be in force before the end of the calendar year.

The new law will not only cover individual people, but also groups of individuals (such as bands and sports teams), legal entities and even fictional characters. 

Guernsey is hoping that the new legislation will lead to celebrities centralising the ownership of their image and other intellectual property rights in the Island. For example, many stars who are resident but not domiciled in the UK already try lawfully to save large sums of UK tax on revenue from sponsorships, merchandising and promotional work (as opposed to income from their primary employment) by structuring them in offshore jurisdictions and not remitting the proceeds to the UK. Guernsey will hope that in the future it will become the leading jurisdiction in which to make such arrangements, because of its clear protective image rights legislation.

 At a time when a chunk of Guernsey’s traditional UK-orientated private wealth business is experiencing tough times due to threats such as the implementation in the UK of a GAAR, the Island’s authorities should be commended on coming up with an innovative new idea. Being first mover is often a crucial advantage in the offshore world, as once a location has a reputation as being the best for a particular type of structure, it becomes difficult for rivals to threaten that status effectively.