§ Mr. BercowTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will make a statement on progress with the Information Society Directive. [90398]
§ Dr. HowellsThe draft EC Directive on copyright and related rights in the Information Society is still under discussion in a Working Group of the Council of Ministers. The European Parliament gave its Opinion in February, and the European Commission have recently published their amended proposal which takes on board many of the Parliament's amendments. As the outgoing German Presidency reported at the Internal Market Council on 21 June, progress has been made on the Directive. However, the common position of the member states is not expected for some time owing to the complex and controversial nature of some of the proposals.
The electronic environment necessitates international harmonisation of copyright laws, and the Government therefore welcome the broad thrust of this Directive and wish to see it adopted as soon as possible. However, there are concerns about certain aspects of the Directive, including the treatment of temporary copies, the approach on exceptions to rights for a broad range of users, and provisions on technical measures. We are pressing in the Council for solutions on these issues which will allow a fair and reasonable balance to be maintained between the interests of all the key players.