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Digital Economy Bill [Lords]

Sir Alan, you have always been a very patient man. I want to apologise to you in advance for the number of amendments that I suspect I will be moving alone. I know that you will patiently bear with me, but we have had to submit amendments and to consider our thoughts at light speed. Those people looking in will find the process as baffling as I am sure some of us in the Chamber do. This basket of amendments is concerned with some definitions and with the scope of the Bill. Amendment 36 amends clause 4(1). This is about trying to identify liability. The wording in the Bill, as it stands, has an assumption of liability when it comes to people receiving notifications. Of course, a wi-fi network might have been used in a household. A parent might be paying for the broadband connection, whereas their children are illegally downloading. The assumption in the current wording is that that parent has authorised the child's infringement of copyright. My amendment would replace that wording with a neutral meaning to provide reassurance to parents up and down the country, students in houses in multiple occupation and anyone who shares a network, as the legislation would not assume guilt when a notification was sent out. Amendment 37 deals with definitions. The lineage of the Bill is that it came out of a consultation that lasted for six months and looked into how we deal with illicit P2P—person-to-person—file sharing. In the amendment, I try to give a narrow definition of P2P file sharing, as opposed to opening up a rather general definition of copyright infringement. If the amendment were accepted, it would probably save embarrassment to many people on both sides of the House because, under the clause as it stands, anyone who downloaded the image of Gene Hunt that has been used by both political parties would be caught by the measure. I will not embarrass one of my very good friends in the Whips Office who every day sends me clipped pieces of news reports from national newspapers, but that practice could be seen as copyright infringement under the clause unless the amendment is accepted.