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Digital Economy Bill [HL]

My Lords, the Minister kindly accepted my previous amendment, which limited the purpose for which technical obligations could be imposed. Dare I hope that he will be equally as receptive to my amendment in this group? Amendment 78 seeks to ensure that Clause 11 is genuinely used only as a backstop power in the event that notification letters and copyright infringement lists have not been successful in making a meaningful impact on unlawful copyright infringement. The Minister’s Amendments 79 and 82 make significant improvements. They require an assessment under Clause 10 to be carried out before any order is made, and ensure that the initial process has a year to bed down before technical obligations are imposed. Both of these are important concessions, and I thank the Minister for tabling them. However, neither point has regard to the success or failure of the notification process and copyright infringement lists. As it is, it would still be possible for technical measures to be imposed, even though Clauses 4 and 9 were working. My amendment would ensure that Clause 11 was resorted to only if necessary. It is possible that the amendment’s wording could be improved, but I hope the Minister will agree that it would be beneficial to be certain that the initial measures had failed before moving to the next step. I beg to move.