Digital Econony Bill

Last week after reading about the Digital Economy Bill and that it might be passed through Parliament without any further debate (in the so-called “wash-up” prior the forthcoming General Election), I wrote to my MP:

What I’m Asking:

Please help prevent the rushing through of the Digital Economy Bill!

Background

There are many things wrong with this bill (see below), but my main concern is that it should receive a proper debate in Parliament. It is my hope that such debate will result in the bill not being passed in anything like its current form.

My Concern

There is a danger of the bill being rushed through _without_ proper debate in the run-up to the General Election.

Why This Matters

There are many draconian aspects to this bill, for example in the powers that it proposes be granted to First Secretary Of State, Peter Mandelson: this is Section 17 of the bill, where legislation can be amended without parliamentary scrutiny: this is wholly inappropriate.

The draconian aspects of this law are opposed by almost everyone, with the exception of the media companies. We should not require draconian new laws to help prop up the outdated business models of companies that cannot compete in the Digital Age.

Summary

It is my great hope that the Digital Economy Bill is not passed in its current form, that would be a tragedy. It would be a greater tragedy, however, if it were passed without any debate whatsoever. That would be truly undemocratic.

Please help ensure this bill is NOT passed without debate.

Yours sincerely,

I got the following reply this morning (apologies for erratically-formatted text, that’s my fault not his):

Thank you for your recent email about the Digital Economy Bill. Lack of effective scrutiny for legislation is something that I
+have a particular concern about – and on which I have been very active in Parliament – and I therefore wanted to take some
+time to craft a personal response to this campaign. I would like to respond firstly to the substantial concerns that remain
+about the Bill itself and secondly to the process by which this Bill is being rushed through

1. DIGITAL ECONOMY BILL – concerns

At our Conference last weekend, the Liberal Democrats overwhelmingly voted for a motion condemning the Digital Economy Bill’s
+website-blocking and disconnection provisions. I worked with its sponsor, Julian Huppert (our candidate for Cambridge), to
+promote the motion. Unlike the other two parties the Liberal Democrats are a democratic party and this motion is therefore
+now part of our party’s policy. The motion is too long to quote here in its entirety (although I recommend you look at it on
+the website http://bit.ly/LD-DEBill ) but the most significant parts are:

Conference condemns:

i) Website-blocking and disconnecting internet connections as a response to copyright infringement.
ii) The threat to the freedom, dignity and well-being of individuals and businesses from the monitoring of their
+internet activity, the potential blocking of their websites and the potential termination of their internet connections,
+which could lead to the closure of internet hotspots
iii) The Digital Economy Bill for focusing on illegal file-sharing rather than on nurturing creativity

Conference supports:

a) The principle of net neutrality, through which all content, sites and platforms are treated equally by user access
+networks participating in the Internet.
b) The rights of creators and performers to be rewarded for their work in a way that is fair, proportionate and
+appropriate to the medium.

Conference therefore opposes excessive regulatory attempts to monitor, control and limit internet access or internet
+publication, whether at local, national, European or global level.

Within Parliament Lib Dems have been working to improve this bad legislation.

We already managed to remove the provisions to allow Lord Mandelson to change copyright law at a stroke. We attempted, with
+our Amendment 120A in the House of Lords which would have changed the Government’s Clause 17, to require the Government to go
+to the High Court to get an injunction if it wanted to require ISPs to block access to websites that persist in publishing a
+substantial amount of copyrighted material despite repeated requests to remove it. It creates quite a high threshold that the
+Government would have to overcome, and ensures that – if this provision is to remain – then there must be proper scrutiny and
+due process. It requires that all of the following conditions are met:

a) The website is holding a “substantial proportion” of copyrighted material;
b) The operator has been contacted a number of times and asked to remove the content but failed to do so;
c) The copyright holder has made a reasonable effort to ensure there are legal ways of accessing the content online;
d) Human rights implications, such as the right to freedom of expression, have been taken into consideration by the
+Court.

Even with this amendment, I believe that the Bill still represents a threat to freedom of expression. I am confident that, due
+to the controversial nature of the Bill, it will not be able to be passed in the likely remaining 8 sitting days of this
+Parliament, or that this measure will go through in the “wash-up” when parliament is about to be resolved and the parties
+negotiate what bits of bills can get through. However I am not complacent about this and it is important that organisations
+such as the Open Rights Group keep up the pressure to ensure that both Labour and the Conservatives are aware of the
+electoral costs of allowing this legislation through.

Particularly following the Conference vote, I would like to take the opportunity to highlight the fact that it is now Liberal
+Democrat policy to oppose:
a) Website blocking and disconnection
b) Sweeping monitoring of internet activity
c) Threats to net neutrality

Liberal Democrats are instinctively opposed to attacks on civil liberties and censorship – and I will continue to vote against
+these extreme proposals whenever they come up.

2. BETTER SCRUTINY

For many years I have been a strong advocate working for better scrutiny of legislation in Parliament. In the abstract it
+seems like something of a technical concern, but in reality it has a fundamental impact on the legislation passed in this
+country. There are countless examples of important Bills where whole groups of amendments or clauses are never even debated
+let alone voted on in the elected House. The reason for this is that the Government has control over the entirety of
+Parliament’s timetable. It cannot be right that the Government regulates (and indeed inhibits) Parliament’s ability to
+scrutinise the Executive – and it seems fairly obvious that it’s the job of legislators to scrutinise legislation.

Recently as a leading member of the elected Wright Committee on the Reform of Parliament I was successful in pushing through
+an amendment, on a cross-party basis, to establish a “House Business Committee” at the start of the next Parliament. This
+would ensure that the House itself, not the Government whips could decide its own timetable, while providing for sufficient
+time for the Government to put forward the business that it was elected on, and mandated to carry out. Scrutiny will
+obviously depend on good MPs to scrutinise the legislation, but this change will at least give them the opportunity to do so
+- an opportunity they are currently denied. A report of my efforts in this area can be found in this article by Henry Porter
+in the Observer: http://bit.ly/cjpDmN

However, another part of the problem for timetabling is that Parliament’s time is very unpredictable, as the Prime Minister
+can call an election at any time. When the election is called there is therefore the issue of what to do with legislation
+that Parliament has spent a lot of time on, but not yet passed into law. Fixed-term Parliaments would get round the problem
+posed by this and the horse-trading the parties (commonly known as the “wash-up”) could no longer even pretend to be
+justified. I, along with the rest of my party, have long supported fixed-term Parliaments.

Accordingly I think I have a strong record of action supporting my belief that legislation should not be passed without
+sufficient and effective scrutiny. But in this case, I have additional concerns about the legislation in question.

Thanks once again for contacting me about this important issue, and thank you for keeping up the pressure against this
+unacceptable legislation.

Yours sincerely

Of course much of the reply is a stock reply, since given the online-organised campaigning against the Bill, MPs will have received many messages similar to mine. However, it’s vaguely reassuring that the LibDem’s are on-board on this one and – if possible – will fight against the Bill simply being ushered into law without further debate.