Despite much criticism and complaint the Digital Economy Act was passed by the UK Parliament during the so called “wash-up” period. The main concern of internet users, ISPs and those in the creative industry was that a bill of this size and such importance had been rushed through Parliament without propper scrutiny. All this happened shortly before the General Election at a time when politicians were talking about “cleaning up politics” in the wake of the MPs expenses scandal.
Before the bill was read in Parliament over 20,000 people wrote to their MPs expressing concern about the content of the bill and the way it was being debated. To many it was the last desperate act of a Labour government struggling under the weight of its own unpopularity. Very few MPs turned up to debate the bill, yet many more voted in its favour.
Now, three months after the Act was passed Internet Service Providers Talk Talk and BT are going to court to seek a judicial review of the controversial Act. They are looking for assurances that the Act was passed using proper Parliementary procedures. As the law currently stands ISPs with 400,000 subscribers or more will be forced to send warning letters to customers accused of illegally downloading copyrighted content. This could potentially damage the profits of BT and Talk Talk if lots of their customers move to smaller ISPs who do not have to comply with the Act.
BT and Talk Talk also want assurances that the Digital Economy Act does not clash with the EU e-commerce directive which states that ISPs should not be held responsible for the content that travels on their networks. In a sense the Act is like if the Highways Agency were held responsible for any stolen goods which are transported on Britain’s motorways. It doesn’t make sense, is impracticle and extremely difficult to monitor.
During the election campaign Nick Clegg was critical of the Digital Economy Act, but now the coalition governement have accounced that it has no plans to change or repeal the Act.
A statement from the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills reads…
“The Digital Economy Act sets out to protect our creative economy from the continued threat of online copyright infringement, which industry estimates costs the creative industries, including creators, £400m per year…
…We believe measures are consistent with EU legislation and that there are enough safeguards in place to protect the rights of consumers and ISPs and will continue to work on implementing them.”
SOURCES:
Torrent Freak
BBC News
Tags: BT, Digital Economy Act, Nick Clegg, Talk Talk
January 20, 2011 at 9:19 pm |
[...] in July 2010 internet service providers Talk Talk and BT announced that they would launch a legal challenge against the Digital Economy Act. The highly controversial bill was passed through parliament in the so called “wash-up” [...]