§ Lord Rixasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether the European Parliament's amendment to Article 5.2(b) of the proposed Copyright in the Information Society Directive means that private copying, such as the timeshifting exception in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, will become illegal if any private party introduces a "reliable and effective" technical means to stop such copying; and [HL1897]
Whether the amendment of the European Parliament to Article 6 of the proposed Copyright in the Information Society Directive would allow the rightholders technically to block lawful copying; and whether it would be unlawful to do anything to allow such lawful copying to take place; and [HL1898]
Whether the European Parliament's amendment to Article 6 of the proposed European Copyright in the Information Society Directive is compliant with Article 11 of the 1996 World Intellectual Property Organisation Copyright Treaty, which does not apply to acts which are authorised or permitted by law. [HL1899]
§ The Minister of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Simon of Highbury)The amendment to Article 5.2(b) of the draft directive proposed by the European Parliament appears to mean that exceptions to rights allowing private copying on digital recording media, such as for time-shifting purposes, would not be permitted in cases where reliable and effective technical protection means are available. However, such technical means could in any event be used to prevent copying, irrespective of whether exceptions to copyright might otherwise apply.
140WAWe do not consider the use of technical means inconsistent with the exceptions in the UK since, although these provide that certain acts are permitted without infringing copyright, they do not in general confer any right to do these acts. There are no restrictions in the UK on the use of technical measures, and Article 6 of the draft directive would not alter this situation. In UK law, provisions already exist to control unauthorised circumvention of technical protection measures, and it is to this aspect that Article 6 is directed. We would agree that careful consideration is necessary of the circumstances under which circumvention should be illegal, and we are not convinced that Article 6 is appropriately worded in this respect, either as originally drafted or as amended by the European Parliament. However, it does not seem to us that the Parliament's amendments are inconsistent with the provisions of Article 11 of the World Intellectual Property Organisation Copyright Treaty, since this establishes only minimum standards of protection against circumvention which contracting parties are free to exceed if they so choose.
§ Lord Rixasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they are in favour of an exception to the proposed European Copyright in the Information Society Directive in order to ensure that people with a learning disability or with a visual or hearing impairment are able to copy copyright works, which they currently have a lawful right to use in order to be able to enjoy equivalent use of that work to a person without the disability. [HL1900]
§ Lord Simon of HighburyWe fully support a provision in the draft directive which would allow member states to provide exceptions to copyright for the benefit of disabled people. At present, the only exception of this kind in the UK relates to sub-titling of broadcasts and cable programmes, but we will carefully consider whether further exceptions for the disabled should be introduced once the content of the directive is settled and we can be certain of the obligations it places on us.
§ Lord Rixasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether the European Parliament's amendment to Article 5.2(b) of the proposed European Copyright in the Information Society Directive means that, in practice, timeshifting will have to be paid for by a levy or some similar payment scheme. [HL1901]
§ Lord Simon of HighburyThe European Parliament's amendments to Article 5.2(b) of the draft directive would require that right owners receive "fair compensation" where exceptions to rights are provided in national law permitting private copying of protected material on audio or audiovisual recording media. However, we do not consider that a levy or other form of payment would be justified in relation to the exception in this field in the UK applying to recording of broadcasts for time-shifting purposes.