---

Internet (Governance)

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Alun Michael) on obtaining the debate, and on his leadership of the new group, the Parliamentary Internet Communications and Technology Forum, of which the hon. Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland) is also a member. PICTFOR is making good strides towards getting people from different places around the table for a series of debates, to which the internet is central. I shall be as swift as I can, Mr Benton, so that another hon. Member can speak. I want to reflect quickly on the Internet Governance Forum in Nairobi, which the Minister attended. Several other colleagues were there too, and I should make the same declaration as my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth with respect to the Register of Members' Financial Interests and Nominet sponsorship. It seemed to me that there were interesting thematic divides at the forum that reflected discussions and debates that we have—or often do not have—here. It is clear, as has already been alluded to, that some Governments see the internet primarily as a threat, whereas others see it as a benefit, but with substantial caveats. The rest of us—although we are not perfect in any respect—tend to see the internet as best advanced through collaboration, common sense and a multi-stakeholder approach. Although the divide is not unbridgeable, in some respects it creates very different perspectives. A society that is not open at the best of times will have some difficulty with the way it manages the internet. That is not to be critical of emerging countries, which have their own challenges, but we hope we can help them to come to a benign or constructive impression of how the power of the internet can be harnessed to everyone's benefit. In this place we tend to discuss technicalities. My right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth mentioned the Digital Economy Act 2010 and relatively few hon. Members engaged with that, although more would do so now, since last year's intake. The reason relatively few engaged with the issue was largely that not a great deal of party politics was involved. It is a bit annoying that the Government insist on being commonsensical on most of the issues; we would rather it were different, as it would make our job as party politicians a lot easier, but it behoves us all to look at the intelligent arguments for pursuing one or another course of action. Of course, there are conflicting ideas about how to approach matters such as copyright, which was mentioned earlier, and freedom of use. I shall not bang on at length, but the Hargreaves report on intellectual property rights seems to me to be an intelligent step forward. It is super that the Government have accepted all 10 of Professor Ian Hargreaves's recommendations. We must be aware that in the coming years it will be a constant—battle is probably too strong a term—contest, perhaps, to ensure that the multi-stakeholder approach that we are calling for endures, and we do not end up with an over-regulated internet. As with anything else, over-regulation would damage it and it would fall apart. That was one of the significant themes I identified. A couple of my colleagues made interventions earlier in the debate, which were perfectly understandable and intelligent, and the kind of things that our constituents raise with us all the time, about bad things that might happen on the internet. An academic called Dr Vicki Nash, who was also at the IGF, said on the UK IGF Network:"““We spend a great deal of time balancing risks, identifying potential harms or assessing trade-offs in key values which does little to convince those who are ambivalent about getting online. Isn't it time we redressed the balance?””" Through no fault of ours—well, who knows; perhaps it is our fault to some degree—there is an awareness in society about potential risks, but less of an awareness of the enormous benefits of the internet. We often think about internet issues through the prism of fear. It seems to me that it would be good if, over time, partly through the leadership of this place and the kind of language we use, we were to try to move beyond that. I suspect that to some degree it boils down to theories of human nature, if that is not too grand. On the whole people will use new things to do good things. We must do what we can to prevent the bad stuff, but inevitably bad stuff will happen, and we must minimise that. However, if we continue to think about the internet and its governance through the prism of fear, we will end up over-regulating it. It is worth referring to a couple of other observations that were made by some of us at the IGF, which were helpfully referred to on the ukigf.org.uk website. One was that some emerging economies or developing countries are concerned about EU blocking practices. I do not mean to say that the practices they have in mind are wrong, with respect to the examples I heard in Kenya, but they see it as a restrictive practice. Lots of stuff coming out of Nigeria gets blocked automatically, because of the country's reputation—deserved or otherwise—for economic crime on the internet. I have never replied to an email by giving my bank account details in the hope of getting the $10 million lodged in my account, so I am not sure how much of what is said is fear-mongering and how much is real, but nevertheless it has led to some emerging countries having their country domain names blocked. That is a pity and I hope that over time the Government, in conjunction with other Governments around the world, can do something about the relevant perceptions and practices. I had not come across the Internet Society before I went to Nairobi. It is a very good organisation, with a good website, showing a series of models of how the internet could evolve. One model is called the common pool: that is, generally, a bit of tussle and roughness along the way, with, in the end, people stressing the collaboration, competition and sound evolution of the internet. There are other models, showing the risks of over-regulation. Governments might over-regulate because they fear the consequences in their own countries—if they fear freedom of speech, for example. Over-regulation might come about because large commercial interests demand that walls are put up for their commercial reasons. We must guard carefully against that and I recommend looking at those models on the isoc.org website. I have been reading a book called ““The Revolution Will Be Digitised”” by Heather Brooke. Many hon. Members will know who she is. I do not see her around here much; perhaps that is for her own protection. She has written a pretty good book, actually. It is a romp through things that have happened—particularly, from the past year or two, WikiLeaks. She mentions the Icelandic modern media initiative, and that pooling of different legislation together for good use is quite interesting. I do not say that it is necessarily the exact model for the future, but it will be interesting to watch it as it evolves in the Icelandic Parliament. Ms Brooke raises an issue that is a core aspect of another of the divides in our discussions of the internet, and the WikiLeaks phenomenon is central to it. There is a trend among some people to laud the release of information for its own sake, and to see that as reflecting a sound, open internet. I am currently a member of the Joint Committee on Privacy and Injunctions, and it is my opinion that a balance must be struck between such openness and privacy. I am not as negative as some hon. Members about the Pirate parties, because I see them as putting a polemical argument that can be deconstructed and can be seen to have some valid points. The clash of ideas is important. It is necessary to listen to those parties' lines of argument, make sense of them and break down some of their assumptions. I have found that they will often accept an argument, and they are a useful addition to the mix—not that I am encouraging any kind of piracy, obviously. The important thing is that we will have to find a balance between privacy—and everyone, including the pirates, stresses the importance of that—and the free flow of information. I do not propose to present the full solution in the next 30 seconds, but it is an important theme, which came out at the IGF. When the IGF was held in Nairobi the Kenyan Government did a super job and flew the flag very well for emerging economies. I took the opportunity, while I was there, to have a long meeting with the Rwandan Foreign Minister. As the Minister knows, this Government have followed the path laid by the previous Administration and formed close contacts with the Rwandan Government. They have also provided strong budgetary support. Rwanda is not a perfect regime, but it is a progressive and positive force. One of things that it has done of which it is proud is to install fibre optic cables across Rwanda. Clearly, it wants to be at the forefront of the internet age, which is a big challenge for such a poor country. I have a particular interest in Rwanda and have found that people refer to Rwanda in all sorts of ways; sometimes they say good things and other times not such good things. When it comes to the internet though, Rwanda is making a genuine effort to bring the benefits of the internet to an impoverished, developing country—albeit one that will hopefully reach middle-income status in the next nine years, which would be a remarkable feat. I encourage the Minister not to see the internet through a prism of fear, cyborgs and men in shiny suits. We are not talking about the silent footfall of the mad cyborg axeman. He should look at the whole area in a constructive way and accept that the divides that exist can often be overcome by intelligent discussion and debate, as I have found in recent discussions with corporate stakeholders and ISPs. The Minister should perhaps reflect on that fact. It behoves all of us to remember the enormous potential benefits that mobile networks and mobile access will bring to Africa.