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Industry Minister Jim Prentice appears to have delayed tabling much-awaited amendments to the Canadian Copyright Act, following growing opposition to what many perceived as a flawed process.

The industry minister gave no indication when the amendments would be tabled in the House of Commons on Monday in response to a direct question.

“A bill will not be tabled in the House until such time as myself and the minister of Canadian Heritage, Status of Women and Official Languages are satisfied,” he told the NDP's Charlie Angus.

The amendments, which are believed to have followed closely legislation in the U.S. that applied strict safeguards to protect artists and music, film and media companies from copyright infringements, was widely expected to be tabled Tuesday.

But the minister's office said there had been no date set for tabling the new copyright bill.

Prentice himself gave no indication of having changed his mind, or whether he was delaying tabling the bill. He could not be reached for comment.

Angus said the minister had put on Monday's order paper that the bill will be introduced, normally an indication that it will be tabled the following day.

“All our industry contacts was telling us Tuesday morning. They said in the Throne Speech they would introduce it this fall,” Angus said. “Now he's seeing consumers are organized for a backlash and he seems to have gotten cold feet.”

The issue has caught fire in personal and consumer blogs on the Internet, led by Michael Geist, the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-Commerce Law at the University of Ottawa.

In Monday's blog, Geist said the delay “provides an exceptional opportunity for minister Prentice to consult more broadly and to factor those concerns in the forthcoming bill in the interests of all Canadians.”

Angus accused the minister of only consulting the U.S. and industry lobbyists who want a crackdown on all forms of copyright infringements, without making allowances for non-commercial personal use, so-called “fair use” or “fair dealing” applications.

Prentice told the House that the government has an obligation to bring in a copyright bill to implement the World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO's) Internet treaties that Canada signed onto in 1997.

But Angus pointed out that the treaty was introduced at a time when the fax machine was cutting edge technology.

“It's quite possible to meet the WIPO obligations and have balanced, progressive copyright for the 21st century,” he said. “We have to separate the counterfeiters and the bootleggers into a clear criminal category and not get that mixed up with fair use.”