Data (Use and Access) Bill [HL]

Baroness Cavendish of Little Venice Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 28th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cashman (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have reluctantly stayed out of this debate precisely because I am a copyright holder with copyrights stretching back over several decades. But, having listened to the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and others, it would be entirely wrong of me to remain silent.

I have to express deep concern and disbelief that the Labour Party of Jennie Lee and of Chris Smith is proposing such a way forward. You cannot on the one hand talk about the importance to every single member of our country—whether at school or going to the high arts of opera—of the importance of the creative industries, and then, with legislation, begin their demolition.

The Government’s approach is entirely wrong. Yes, they can strip away my rights. Indeed, only last week I received the huge sum of £1.76 for a performance. But that £1.76 represented a contract between an artist and someone who used the artist’s material. We are destroying that principle of contract.

These amendments seem sensible, rational and reasonable, and they open the door for the development of AI in exactly the same way as when, as one of the offices of the British Actors’ Equity Association in the early 1990s, we were tasked with negotiating with the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 on the brilliant and new innovation of cable and satellite. We negotiated in order to try to protect artists, some hugely successful and some not so successful. Those negotiations took two years—although we do not have two years now—and at the start of them we were told that we would never reach an agreement. We reached an agreement, which has been adapted and adopted for all other forms of the use of television and audio material.

Are the Government seriously telling us that we do not have the wit, intelligence or drive as a country to come to an adequate negotiation that protects copyright and advances AI? If they are seriously telling us that, I urge noble Lords to disregard it. I urge your Lordships most of all to vote not for the Elton Johns or the Paul McCartneys but for that one person who might be relying on that £1.76, and support these amendments.

[Baroness Cavendish of Little Venice (CB)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on a barnstorming speech.

Many of the points that I wanted to make have already been made by others, so I will be brief. I declare my interest as a rights holder. I am slightly worried that this is beginning to sound like special pleading, and I hope that is not the effect it has. I am also the daughter of two writers, and I recognise that £1.76, because sometimes that was it. That £1.76, as the noble Lord has just said, is a contract. There are many artists, musicians and writers in this country who get money for their books in libraries or tiny amounts of royalties, and those royalties are keeping them alive. They enable them to create original work and earn their living.

I believe that generative AI will be transformational and largely for the good. However, it is perfectly possible to distinguish between meaningful progress that advances humanity—we heard in an earlier debate about AI tracking naval ships, and brilliant advances are being made in medicine—and plain theft of intellectual property. That theft has been going on now for several years, and the people who are being stolen from are not even aware that their work has been stolen.

For that reason, I do not actually believe it is necessary to seek a balance. This is not about balance; it is about implementing and upholding the rule of law. The proposed rights reservation from the Government would reverse the fundamental principle of UK copyright law, which, as others have said, was established in 1710—I think it was 1710, not 1709, but we may differ. My mother wrote the Handbook of Copyright in British Publishing Practice in 1974, so I have some visceral memory of all this. The Government are proposing to reverse the fundamental protections that have made us a gold standard in the world. The amendments propose to make UK copyright law enforceable in an age of generative AI—to respond and expand our laws, in what is in my view an extremely proportionate way, to recognise the rights of creators.

We have all learned something in this debate that is astonishing to me: apparently the Government have not conducted an economic impact assessment of their proposals on one of our most successful industries. I find that completely shocking. It suggests a lack of seriousness on the part of this Government and those who are making these proposals, which I hope the Minister will address later.

If artists, musicians and creators cannot earn a living, there will be no original content and no more content for AI to build on. That is surely in itself an economic argument that somewhat undermines the vague idea that innovation cannot happen without the wholesale abolition of our proud tradition of copyright. Chris Bryant said last night that something must change and that we cannot do nothing. I agree, but what we must do is double down.

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)]

My Lords, I support these amendments and the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron. Not to do so would be, to quote some of her earlier work, beyond the edge of reason.

I support the noble Baroness because I support creatives. They are the individuals who bring such sweet sound where otherwise there would be silence, who fill a blank page with words that can move our hearts, our souls and our minds, and can change the course of history. I support the amendments because I support the rule of law. IP and copyright are well established over centuries.

This is not complex or controversial. There is an extraordinary tedium to the whole question of TDM. Ultimately, I could do this in three words when addressing big tech: “It’s not yours. Take your audacious hands off other people’s work”. And that is from someone who is pro-innovation, pro-AI and pro-technology—but in a way where there is a negotiation and agreed conclusion as to how artists, rights holders and creatives want to engage with these technologies.

We have already heard many times, rightly, that there has been no economic impact assessment. I ask the Minister for his views on that. While on that subject, I ask him, out of genuine interest, what is the genesis of the £400 billion figure in the AI opportunities plan? Where does it come from, what is it based on and how does it sit against the impact that not acting will have on our creative sector?

I support these amendments, and I urge everyone in your Lordships’ House to do so. To misquote the late, great Dennis Potter, “Vote, vote, vote for Beeban Kidron”.