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Digital Economy Bill [HL]

My Lords, I shall start with Amendment 103. I am surprised that the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, wants to see the removal of this provision, which is there to protect subscribers. It will ensure, so far as is practicable, that a subscriber who has successfully appealed against a notification, should not suffer any harm as a result of that particular notification. This would include, for example, a subscriber being taken off a serious infringer list if a successful appeal meant that the subscriber no longer met the required threshold. Let us reflect on what will happen under the Government’s proposals before a subscriber would become subject to any technical measure: an alleged infringement is detected and matched to his account; a notification is issued and he can contest that; a number of subsequent alleged infringements will have been detected and matched to his account; he will get another notification, which he can also contest; yet further alleged infringements will have been matched to his account, and he will be notified that technical measures will be applied; again, he can contest it. Let us imagine that now he does appeal. The copyright owner and ISP will have to prove that each and every copyright infringement report that led to his being in that position was a genuine copyright infringement and that it was properly matched to his account. It is frankly not credible to suggest that, at that point, there has been an insufficiently rigorous process. Neither can I see what benefit there would be in requiring that a court should look at a case where the subscriber does not appeal but accepts that the notifications are valid and that the measure is properly applied. That was the whole purpose behind building in these appeal procedures at every stage. We do not want to apply technical measures to anyone. We want them to stop infringing copyright. We also do not want to drag people before the courts, which is always a stressful experience for anyone, unless there is a genuine need to do so. The appeals route we have set out should offer a less stressful, less expensive route for the first appeal, as we have already discussed and given assurances on, but it does require the final appeal to be heard by a judicial body, ensuring that the subscriber does have the equivalent of the protection of a court. We believe that that is right. Finally, the question of multiple IP addresses is so technical in nature that we will reply to the noble Earl in writing. On the question of the EU provisions, we do not believe that anything we are proposing will conflict with them. We have checked the position carefully and we adhere to our view in that respect. I am afraid that we cannot support the amendment and I urge the noble Lord, in taking into account the points I have made, to withdraw it.