The Writers’ Guild of Canada (WGC) has finalized a new two-year collective bargaining agreement with domestic producers, which now covers animation scribes. This conclusion ends 18-months of negotiation between the WGC, Canadian Film and Television Production Association and its Quebec counterpart, l’Association des Producteurs de Films et de Television du Quebec (APFTQ). The new Independent Production Agreement (IPA) sets out minimum workplace requirements for Canadian film and TV writing. The long unprotected Canadian animation writer is finally covered under the new plan. The move is strongly supported by the pending Cinar fraud case, which alleges that the toon house used fake Canadian names on scripts written by U.S. writers, to obtain lucrative Canadian tax credits. "It’s a fair deal that will provide improved terms for all writers and extends the IPA to cover the rapidly growing animation sector," said WGC exec director Maureen Parker in the HOLLYWOOD REPORTER. "It’s been a long haul, but the number of issues on the table made for a complex bargaining process." New terms in the IPA are a 10% across the board pay increase for produced scripts, increased script fees for work in development and a new incentive plan for low-budget movies, which allows more writers and producers to be covered under the IPA.