Last week has been Recess for the House of Commons, and the Government is making the most out of the break from regularly Parliamentary business with numerous foreign trips to discuss trading relationships around the world.

Anti Copying in Design (ACID) is a member of The Alliance for Intellectual Property and each week The Alliance creates a parliamentary update which ACID shares with its members.

Theresa May has been in Jordan and Saudi Arabia to discuss security and trade (Saudi Arabia is the UK’s largest trading partner in the Middle East), Philip Hammond has been in India, Liam Fox has been in South East Asia and Boris Johnson & Priti Patel have attended the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Luxembourg.

The row between the Government and Spain continues over Gibraltar, with its Chief Minister stating that the territory wishes to stay British and that this message should be made clear across the EU. The Prime Minister and Defence Secretary have both confirmed that Gibraltar will be protected, and it is worth noting that Gibraltarians rejected by 99% the idea of the UK sharing sovereignty with Spain in 2002. Spain has long contested the UK’s 300 year rule of Gibraltar.

On Monday, Russia was victim of a terrorist attack by a suicide bomber in St Petersburg, where 14 people sadly lost their lives with a further 49 injured. We have also seen a chemical weapons attack in Syria killing at least 80 people, including many children, widely believed to have been orchestrated by the Assad regime, which has seen a retaliatory bombing of an airbase by the Trump administration. The UK is supportive of Trump’s response, and predictably Putin has condemned the attack. This afternoon, Stockholm has also been the victim of an attack where a stolen lorry drove into innocent pedestrians – the details of which are still unknown at this time.

Digital Economy Bill

On Wednesday, the Digital Economy Bill continued its Third Reading in the House of Lords. Issues discussed were: bill limits for mobile phone contracts, various strategic priorities (Clause 10) or ‘tidying up amendments’, internet pornography and age verification, proposed charging regulations for the Information Commissioner, pension liabilities under the Telecommunications Act 1984, electronic communications code: transitional provision,

Clause 37 (copyright)

Clause 37: Copyright etc where broadcast retransmitted by cable

Amendment 9

Moved by

Lord Ashton of Hyde – 9: Clause 37, page 36, line 8, leave out subsections (3) to (5). Amendment 9 agreed.

Lord Ashton closed the debate expressing gratitude to Lord Stevenson and Lord Clement-Jones specifically. Lord Clement-Jones used the opportunity to reflect on the Bill: “There were amendments on remote e-book lending and listed events—the list goes on, which demonstrates that the Government were listening… Of course, we did not get everything on our shopping list as the Bill went through… and I think that IPTV is something that may come back to haunt us.”

The Bill has now passed Third Reading and will return to the House of Commons for further debates on the Lords’ Amendments.

IPTV Call for Views

Today is the deadline for the IPO’s Call for Views on IPTV. Please click here for Alliance’s final response, and many thanks to those who have contributed.

Iain Wright stresses IP in the Industrial Strategy

The Chairman of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Select Committee has written a blog stating that the Government should put IP protection at the heart of the industrial strategy. He reflects on the overwhelming success of the creative industries, and how people accessing content illegally are damaging the sector. He pays tribute to the Get it Right campaign by saying that it takes a whole new approach to dealing with online copyright infringement, and says that we all have a responsibility to ensure our creative industries are protected from copyright theft.

Dates for your diary:

30th March – 18th April – Parliamentary Recess

17th April – Industrial Strategy Consultation deadline

25th May – 5th June – Parliamentary Whitsun Recess

20th July – 5th September – Parliamentary Summer Recess

16th September – 19th September – Liberal Democrat Party Conference, Bournemouth

24th September – 27th September – Labour Party Conference, Brighton

1st October – 4th October – Conservative Party Conference, Manchester

IP (Unjustified Threats) Bill is currently awaiting Royal Assent.

The above does not represent policy but is a weekly report of parliamentary activity prepared by the Alliance on IP matters and other broad areas of interest to the creative industries which the Alliance has shared with its members.