---

Digital Economy Bill [Lords]

I shall be brief, because time is short. I am possibly one of the few Members who have suffered directly from illegal copying. When I produced my video game it was almost immediately copied, and I presume that I lost some royalties from that. So I do not consider this to be a completely trivial problem, as has been suggested. However, there are two basic difficulties. First, the remedy is inappropriate. I am completely open to the argument that we should have stricter penalties for people who seek to make money out of illegal copying, from which many young people, to whom we referred earlier, might benefit. However, young people are not the primary instigators. The primary instigators are the people who make the original illegal copy and sell it on for gain. If we blocked internet access for individuals who make use of illegal copying, that would be inappropriate in two ways: they are not the primary instigators, and although we can imagine that perhaps they should be fined, we would be denying them access at a time when society as a whole increasingly depends on access, and when we are attempting to reduce the digital divide. By analogy, if I misused the postal service and as a penalty I was no longer allowed to receive letters, that would simply not be the right solution. Secondly, owners of copyright are generally quite powerful in their financial resources. I take the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North (Stephen Pound) that some of them may be start-up bands and not very well set, but there has been reluctance among major companies to pursue copyright infringements. Sometimes the infringements can be helpful in their marketing. As one of my constituents has said to me, targeting ISPs is a bit as though we were prosecuting road maintenance workers because the council had failed to impose the correct restrictions on how the roads were used. The ISP should not be our primary target in attempting to attack the problem.