European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 5th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Altmann]

My Lords, I support Amendment 43, moved by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, and supported by the noble Lords, Lord Foster and Lord Foulkes, and to which I have added my name. I also support the thrust of Amendments 44 and 45. I will try to be brief in light of the hour.

Amendment 43 aims to ensure that the Government maintain their pledge not to water down rights if we leave the EU. I do not see why the Bill needs to explicitly remove the right to Francovich protection, which allows citizens—individuals and small businesses—to sue the Government for damages resulting from past breaches of EU law. I hope that my noble friend the Minister will reconsider the removal of this protection; otherwise, we will lose a key last-bastion protection for citizens and small businesses, which allows them some remedy against harm caused to them by government policy.

The Government say that people will still be able to sue in the UK courts, but in practice this power is not normally exercisable. I have personal involvement in this area and have seen how difficult it is to mount a legal challenge against the Government. A judicial review must be launched within a very short timescale, which most ordinary individuals would struggle to meet. When I was helping the 150,000 members of final salary pension schemes, including Dexion and Allied Steel and Wire, who had lost their entire company pension and part of their state pension as a result of flawed laws which failed to properly protect their pension rights when their company became insolvent, despite being obliged to do so by the EU insolvency directive, I had to find lawyers who would work on a no win, no fee basis. Even then, the Government refused to agree not to pursue the claimants for their costs if we lost. These poor claimants faced losing all their assets, including their home, when taking the Government to court. Realistically, most people simply could not take such pressure.

It is unreasonable to remove the last-resort protection that such people have, which would allow them to appeal to the EU courts under Francovich protection for a ruling which would not risk the same costs and difficulties as a UK court action against the Government. If an EU directive was implemented wrongly, and the Government had not introduced sufficient protections, despite being obliged to do so, the amendment would ensure that the Bill does not remove people’s last resort to redress. I hope that the Government will agree to this amendment or produce their own version.

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 43, and I support Amendments 44 and 45. I begin by disagreeing slightly with the noble Lord, Lord Carlile. I suspect that I am in a minority: those of us who are not lawyers.

However, I am very conscious that during our deliberations so far we have heard many times that the Bill is intended to ensure that,

“as a general rule, the same rules and laws will apply after we leave the EU as they did before”.

About an hour ago we heard a very powerful reiteration of that from the noble Lord, Lord Duncan, who made it very clear that he believes what the Government seek to achieve. Yet that has to be put alongside the continuing concern in the other place and in many parts of your Lordships’ House that somehow or other Schedule 1 provides the Government with a get out of jail free card—an opportunity to have a series of measures which appear at least to curtail some of the legal rights and remedies we have enjoyed as a result of our membership of the European Union. A glaring example of that was well illustrated by the noble Lords, Lord Davies and Lord Carlile, and the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, and is contained in paragraph 4 of Schedule 1 in relation to Francovich.

As the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, rightly pointed out, Francovich is not just some right whereby anybody who feels slightly aggrieved by their Government not properly implementing some piece of EU legislation can immediately start action. Three clear criteria have to be met and have already been laid out: that there are rights conferred on an individual, that the breach was sufficiently serious, and that there is a clear causal connection between the breach and the damage sustained by the individual.

It seems clear, at least to me as a non-lawyer, that if paragraph 4 of Schedule 1 remains in the Bill, no retrospective claims under Francovich will be permitted, and certainly not if the proceedings have not been started before exit. In those cases, individuals will lose their ability to claim damages against the state for failure to implement EU laws and directives issued pre-exit. This would mean that the victim of a government failure to correctly implement an EU law must have started action before exit day, but that will not always have been possible and would seem contrary to natural justice. Access to justice, including the ability to challenge the actions of the state before a court of law, is central to the rule of law. If paragraph 4 of Schedule 1 remains as it stands, it seems that access to justice for some people will be denied.

I was in your Lordships’ House some 10 days ago when we heard during exchanges on the Statement on air quality that the High Court had ruled that the Government’s air quality plan, designed to tackle nitrogen dioxide in the air, was unlawful. The Court ruling said:

“It is now eight years since compliance with the 2008 Directive should have been achieved. This is the third, unsuccessful, attempt the Government has made at devising”,


an air quality plan,

“which complies with the Directive and the domestic Regulations."

The judge, Mr Justice Garnham, added,

“In the meanwhile, UK citizens have been exposed to significant health risks”.


It may be that some individuals will wish to argue, under the rule of Francovich, that they have suffered damage and deserve compensation because of the Government’s failure to implement the 2008 directive. Without Amendment 43, or some similar measure, such individuals will be prevented from seeking justice unless they submit their claim and have their case under way before exit day.

In the other place, many other examples of potential loss of access to justice under Francovich were raised. Initially the Minister there, Dominic Raab, offered assurances that:

“Individuals will not lose their ability to vindicate their rights in court after exit”.—[Official Report, Commons, 14/11/17; col. 290.]


It may be—I have no way of knowing—that he believes that to be the case because of Section 16 of the Interpretation Act 1978, which provides that,

“where an Act repeals an enactment, the repeal does not, unless the contrary intention appears ... affect any right, privilege, obligation or liability … accrued or incurred under that enactment”.

So the right to claim under the rule of Francovich post-exit would seem to depend on whether the Bill before us provides an effective and clear contrary intention. Can the Minister tell us clearly whether the Government believe that paragraph 4 of Schedule 1 provides a clear contrary intention, within the meaning of Section 16 of the Interpretation Act 1978?

Certainly, there are some other lawyers who appear very uncertain about that point. For example, the very helpful briefing from James Segan of Blackstone Chambers leads me to conclude that seeking justice by arguing that there was no contrary intention or that it had been introduced ineffectively would lead litigants into a legal quagmire, so I was slightly heartened when in the other place a little later in the deliberations the Minister changed his tune when pressed by, among others, Conservative MPs Robert Neill, Dame Cheryl Gillan and Sir Oliver Letwin. He told them that he acknowledged the importance of legitimate expectations and agreed to see whether these concerns could be addressed, at least transitorily, by regulation rather than in the Bill. I hope that the Minister can update us on progress on that thinking. He has already said in relation to other aspects of Schedule 1 that the Government are willing to do that.

I would have thought that by far the better route to securing the continuation of the rights under Francovich would be to accept Amendment 43 or something like it, and ensure that the Bill makes it clear that when the Government say that the same rules and laws will apply after we leave the EU, they really mean it.

[Lord Pannick]

I have two questions for the Minister. First, will he accept that the right to damages under the Francovich principle is more generous to claimants than the common law principle of judicial review under which you very rarely have a right to claim damages as you need to prove misfeasance in public office or something similar? Does he accept that Francovich is more generous? Secondly, does he accept that it therefore follows that paragraph 4 of Schedule 1 to the Bill conflicts with the Government’s purpose in bringing forward this Bill, which is to read across all existing rights that are enjoyed under EU law? If he accepts that, what is the justification for making an exception for Francovich damages?

Leveson Inquiry Update

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Thursday 1st March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I entirely concur with my noble friend on that last point. We have heard repeatedly the concerns that were voiced, particularly by the local press, over the potential impact of the implementation of Section 40 and the adverse effect it would have had upon our local press and consequently upon the maintenance of our local democracy.

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, do the Government still believe that the press should be regulated by a truly independent body which fully complies with the criteria laid out by Sir Brian Leveson and was supported on all sides of your Lordships’ House?

[Lord Keen of Elie]

We consider that the present arrangements, particularly those reflected in IPSO, are working well with regard to the press.

Digital Economy Bill

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 20th March 2017 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Foster of Bath]

29A: Clause 80, page 84, line 3, at end insert “and taking due account of the merits of the case”.

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

Wow, my Lords, what a tour de force.

Some time ago, we were debating the last string of amendments, during which the Minister sought to achieve the impossible and, according to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, almost succeeded. In moving Amendment 29A, which is in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Clement-Jones, I am going to ask the Minister not to achieve the impossible, but merely to give a very clear statement to the House at the end of the debate, with which I hope we will then be satisfied, so that we can move on.

In Clause 80 at the moment, the Government seek to change the regime for appeals from Ofcom decisions from an appeal on the merits to one which follows a judicial review standard. As the Minister is well aware, the move is opposed by the vast majority of the telecoms industry, including the most significant investors in telecoms infrastructure. It is also opposed by many smaller players, by new entrants and by the industry bodies, the CBI and techUK.

Ofcom is an immensely powerful regulator which can make life-or-death decisions for these companies and their investors. The industry players feel that it is only fair that they should have the protection of due process. They believe that changing the appeals regime in the way proposed introduces significant regulatory uncertainty into the UK investment environment.

There is no evidence that has convinced us that Clause 80 is necessary, let alone desirable. Many claims have been made to support the need for a change that have transpired to be simply wrong. For example, it was initially claimed that it would bring Ofcom appeals into line with other sectors, but that point has now been dropped. The Minister made that very clear at col. 1737 in our deliberations in Committee on 8 February. It was also claimed that the new approach would be quicker, but evidence clearly shows that judicial reviews can take at least as long as current telecoms appeals. Many other claims were made which were effectively debunked in Committee by my noble friend Lord Clement-Jones.

Despite all that, in Committee, the Minister refused to accept an amendment which would have done no more than duplicate the wording of the EU directive, which implements the right to appeal under consideration. Rather strangely, the Minister said:

“I acknowledge that the amendment essentially replicates the wording of Article 4 of the EU framework directive, albeit it is not identical to it. While this would in one view remove the gold-plating of the existing standard in a technical sense, the Government consider that it would not lead to any substantive change in approach”.—[Official Report, 8/2/17; col 1739.]


In that statement, he seems to indicate a lack of faith in the judicial bodies responsible for hearing appeals, almost implying that they are not capable of applying the law properly. I say that because the only alternative interpretation of what he said is that the Government now intend to underimplement the framework directive and put in place a standard which does not meet the European requirements.

On the one hand, we are assured by the Government that the words in Clause 80 will allow appeal bodies to take due account of the merits, but the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, by saying that a substantive change of approach was required, implied something different. After all, the language of Clause 80 plainly refers only to judicial review. As traditionally understood, this would absolutely not encompass consideration of “merits”.

I argue that there is a real risk of ambiguity that could cause confusion when the first cases are taken under the provision. I hope that the noble and learned Lord will not only respond to the general point but give a clear statement about what exactly is intended by Clause 80 and whether the appeal bodies will be allowed to do what the framework directive says, which is to ensure that,

“the merits of the case are duly taken into account”.

Just before I finish, I ask the Minister to give one more clarification on an issue about which there is confusion. He will recall that during debate in Committee, my noble friend Lord Lester raised with him the point that judicial review in cases that do not relate to European directives do not have merits taken into account, whereas in relation to European directives they do. The debate was about proportionality. The Minister was very clear when he said,

“here we are dealing with judicial review in the context of the EU framework directive, which requires that the merits of the case are duly taken into account in any appeal”.—[Official Report, 8/2/17; col 1738.]

That is the sort of clear statement that I hope that he will repeat today. I hope that he can go further and explain what will happen post Brexit—although I assume that the entire EU directive will be transposed into UK law. Then, perhaps we will maintain the proportionality to which he referred and the merits will continue to be taken into account. I hope that he can clarify that for me, as well as give that clear statement—not an impossible task—and we can then quickly move on.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Foster of Bath]

My Lords, it is late but I would love to rebut some of the Minister’s remarks about rerunning arguments, swathes of evidence, frustrating delays, uncertainty and so on. If he looks at the Ministry of Justice’s own figures over the last 10 years, judicial review took on average between 9.3 and 13 months. I can compare that with many merits-based cases that have taken considerably less time under the current Ofcom regime. He talked about no other regulators operating in that way: I point out that the water, electricity, health, aviation and post sectors all currently face scrutiny under regimes that do require consideration of merits.

However, I do not want to go into all those details. I thank the Minister because he has, in effect, said what I wanted him to say. It was half put on the record on 8 February when he talked about the requirement for the merits of a case to be,

“duly taken into account in any appeal”.—[Official Report, 8/2/17; col. 1737.]

That has been repeated today. Disappointingly, the Minister said no more about what will happen post Brexit, other than that it is a matter we will consider in due course. Nevertheless, I thank the Minister for at least going some way to providing what I asked for and beg leave to withdraw.

Amendment 29A withdrawn.

Digital Economy Bill

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 8th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I was slightly surprised at the way the Minister rebuffed concerns about the way in which Parliament engaged with the royal charter process last time. It might be because he joined us halfway through, to a little bit of shock but quite a lot of pleasure. Looking back on it, I do not think it can be said that Parliament was as engaged as it wished to be in the process. The ability to speak on two occasions when Statements were graciously made by Ministers, and to speak in one debate focusing, at that stage, on the draft charter, with the agreement as yet not finalised, can hardly be described as participating actively in the process. I think we can agree to differ on that point. I am sure that noble Lords who spoke in the earlier debate had a very different version of how that might have gone, including involvement by Select Committees and involvement in the detail, which would have resulted in proper and effective scrutiny of the Government’s proposals and the eventual outcome.

This amendment, by serendipity, actually deals with some of the fall-out of the rather deficient process we are going through. When charters are drafted, considered and debated, they are never alone: there are lots of other things going on. Many people present will be able to give witness to that effect. One of the things that sometimes gets missed out is the detail in the agreement. The agreement, of course, is really the mechanics of how the arrangement between the Government and the BBC works in practice. One was brought in in such a way and at such a time that it was never discussed in your Lordships’ House or in the other place. It only really became an issue once the charter was about to be sealed. The issue was the changes to the way national radio output was to be operated in future, which were being imposed on—although not necessarily resisted by—BBC management. That is the subject of this amendment.

Amendment 222E is a probing amendment, asking the Government to conduct a review of an important sector of the creative economy. It does not specifically relate to the BBC—although it is cued into something that is happening there—but it would provide useful information and detail that would be of interest to the Committee. If the review were carried out in the way I suggest, with a report covering a range of topics related to radio production, I hope it could be brought to your Lordships’ House and generate a good discussion.

In short, about 60% of BBC national radio output is going to be put out to competitive tender over the next few years, to 2020. Over the past 20 years, BBC radio has actually increased its external commissioning from zero to around 20% of output. That is quite a slow rate of progress, but that is not unconnected with the fact that we are talking about a very fragile sector of the creative industries. Radio production does not involve a very large group of people. The independents are usually quite small and not in the habit of operating on a scale that would enable them to take over the huge increase in the proportion of radio that we are talking about.

The proposal would mean an extra 3,000 hours of national radio output being put out to tender every year. That, of course, does not come free of charge, but with the cost of a commissioning process in-house at the BBC. Therefore, it is not all a one-way process: there will be additional costs. Those costs will not be funded by any additional funding from the licence fee or any other process, so there is bound to be a squeezing of radio budgets, and neither external nor in-house producers will be able to rely on getting any increase. It is going to be a rather difficult situation, affecting the people involved. Current in-house BBC radio producers will find that their jobs are largely going to disappear, because, although a significant number of programmes will be retained in-house, the 60% figure means that the majority will be produced externally.

The question of how the BBC will continue to operate as a major trainer in this area must be raised, because without the numbers, that training might well be at risk. Who else is going to do the training to ensure that radio has a flow of qualified people coming forward? Smaller independent production companies might not be able to scale up either quickly enough or with sufficient range to compete against those that will, perhaps, sweep the pool.

This is a really big change in an important part of our national life—a real adjustment—and it has not been given sufficient scrutiny. Given that it was not discussed in Parliament as far as I am aware and was hardly raised externally, the Government have a duty to think harder about the issues arising. The allegation was made that this proposal did not emerge from any consideration of the needs and purposes of BBC radio production, or indeed the independent radio production sector. In meetings I had with those involved, I was told that the ask for the independent sector was to get from the current 20% of output to 25% by 2020—in other words, a marginal increase on the existing arrangements. To go from 20% to 60% reflects what I think must have been external pressures. That rather makes the point that we need to know more about what is going on, and transparency would help.

The main purpose of the amendment is to focus on the situation that will emerge after 60% of national radio output is put out to competitive tender, and the benefits that will flow from that. I beg to move.

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, I have much sympathy with the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, although I have some disagreements with it as well, which I will come to. As the noble Lord said, the new charter obligation commits the BBC to extending competition for radio production. It was my understanding that that proposal came directly from the BBC—that it was not, as the noble Lord suggested, imposed on but not necessarily resisted by BBC management. As he said, it may or may not have been rather more than the independent radio producers were expecting or had requested. The Committee would benefit from hearing from the Minister a little about the background to this part of the charter and agreement.

What is clear is that it has been agreed that from April 2017, over a six-year period, the BBC will open up 60% of relevant hours—that is non-news, news-related current affairs or repeats—to competition both from in-house and indie producers. That represents about 27,000 hours of programming per year being open to competition. Although it will not go as far as what is happening in television, it is a further development of the process that began right back in 1992, when the BBC voluntarily made 10% available to independent production. That has developed over a number of years. The 10% voluntary figure was made compulsory, we then saw further developments and eventually the “compete and compare” framework was introduced, designed to drive up standards, reduce costs and ensure continuous improvement in all areas of operation.

Of course, the 60% available for competition does not guarantee the independent sector extra commissions. Independent companies will obviously have to have sufficiently good ideas and be able to demonstrate a track record of producing sufficiently high-quality content. The independent sector, of about 150 relatively small companies spread right across the country, has a growing track record of producing high-quality content and helping to increase the range and diversity of content available to BBC radio services. They produce some great programmes that win awards, and since the guide price for radio production is the same for both in-house and external producers, there is no increase in the production cost to the BBC.

It is good to hear that the independent sector is increasingly involved in training the next generation of producers through training programmes and mentoring schemes, helping to improve diversity: around 60% of learners are women, 15% are from BAME backgrounds, and 5% are people with a disability. But we have to be alert, as the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, suggested, to the impact these changes may have on the BBC and its own staff. They will certainly need increased levels of training and skills to negotiate, so that they can compete on a level playing field with the independents.

The review that is called for in the amendment is of course sensible, but we question whether it should take place quite as early in the process as recommended by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson. The 60% target for competition does not come into full effect until the end of 2022, which should provide the independent sector with plenty of time to develop the scale and expertise to pitch to make more programmes. It also allows time for the BBC to retrain and restructure. But the BBC acknowledges that while greater competition should deliver greater efficiency in programme costs, increasing the number of commissions open to competition threefold will require a larger in-house commissioning team, and there is already a potential impact on other in-house staff. I understand that the BBC is already in discussions with staff and trade unions about that.

It would make sense to have a review, but it should perhaps take place at the midway point between Royal Assent and 31 December 2020. If we are to have such a review, we need to look at some other issues that may form part of it, not least the BBC’s commissioning process, to ensure that the developing competition between in-house and independents is truly fair. However, we support the broad principle of the proposed review.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Stevenson and Lord Foster, for their contributions. I start with something that has nothing to do with this. I point out to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, who said that I did not realise quite what was going on with the BBC because I only joined halfway through, that the BBC was debated 19 times before the BBC charter review in various different forms—so it certainly had an outing if not in quite the way that noble Lords might have wished.

Moving on to the amendments in this group, the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, concerns the impact of the BBC’s new royal charter on radio production. There has been a lot of misinformation and confusion about this change, so I hope to set the record straight. In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Foster, the proposal for change originated from the BBC. It was well received by the Radio Independents Group, which had for a number of years been seeking to have more opportunities to bid for commissions from the BBC. Following negotiations between those two bodies, it was announced by the director of BBC Radio in June 2015. That agreement predated the publication of the BBC Green Paper.

Under the agreement, the BBC agreed to move from the current very limited quota-based arrangements to a new commissioning structure, opening up 60% of eligible hours to competition by 2022. This is a change that we strongly support, since it gives significant new opportunities to the growing independent radio production sector and gives BBC radio audiences access to the best ideas out there. But increasing the competition between independent and in-house productions does not guarantee, as the noble Lord, Lord Foster, reminded us, that the independent sector will receive more commissions. Companies will have to bid for work and BBC in-house staff will still be capable of winning. Unlike TV, there will still be, in effect, an in-house guarantee of 40% of all programmes, which reflects the BBC’s continuing importance to radio.

The new BBC charter sets a firm timescale for the implementation of this change. However, the timescale for the transition—by 2022—was set by the agreement between the BBC and the RIG in June 2015. It has to be for the BBC to consider the transitional arrangements in consultation with the independent production sector and to report on them as appropriate. These are operational matters for the BBC and it is not for us to have to report on them. The BBC already reports on a number of its production and commissioning outcomes across TV and radio and I am sure that it will continue to strive for transparency here. I do, however, acknowledge the concerns that the noble Lords, Lord Stevenson and Lord Foster, raised about the implications for BBC staff.

The changes are being introduced with a long transition and both the BBC and RIG are taking steps to ensure that the transition is as smooth as possible. The noble Lord, Lord Foster, talked about training. There is a strong ethos of training and diversity in the independent sector. For example, the next RIG offers a training programme that so far has provided training days to 1,089 individual learners, including a diversity mentoring scheme. Of the learners, 60% are women, 15% are BME and 5% are disabled. The RIG encourages its members to recruit from a diverse pool of candidates and also liaises with the BBC’s diversity team. It encourages its members to match the BBC’s employment conditions.

I am sure that both the BBC and the radio industry will pay close attention to the points raised by noble Lords today and take steps to ensure that the transition is handled as sensitively as possible. Fundamentally, though, this is about giving commissioners greater choice and ensuring that listeners have access to the best possible radio shows.

With that explanation, I hope that the noble Lord will be able to withdraw his amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Puttnam]

My Lords, I support the amendment but come at it from a slightly different angle. The noble Baroness, Lady Buscombe, will remember that she and I discussed ad nauseam the issues of the EPG and we were very much on the same side. There is blame on both sides here. We failed at the time to persuade the then Government that common sense should make an organised EPG easy to use and that the public service broadcasters should be high on it. Today, if you go across the top bar, find sport and click on it, you will not find any sport on the BBC. You have to go back to the “all channels” menu. It is an absurdity.

We are here to discuss what will become the Digital Economy Act 2017. The notion that in 2017 we are not able to have a personalised programme guide in the same way as we would have on our iPhones, is daft. I am afraid that the blames lies with the then Government, who were persuaded by Sky that it had invested significantly in the EPG and had the right to amortise its investment. Honeyed words were given from the Front Bench that of course this would be reviewed quite quickly. It never has been reviewed and the absurdity of this so-called amortised investment has gone on now for 14 years. I suggest, and hope the Minister will sympathise, that this is the time to get real with this. It is 2017. An EPG should be able to be personalised very easily by the individual consumer and that is the way it should work.

[Lord Foster of Bath]

My Lords, clearly there is a lot of agreement about your Lordships’ Communications Committee’s recommendation that we have a new, up-to-date, fit-for-purpose EPG regime, which may also take on board the suggestions of the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam. We desperately need it.

Many examples have already been given: the difficulty of finding CBeebies and CBBC under a large number of cartoons; the difficulty of finding the iPlayer or the ITV Player on the first page of an on-demand screen on a smart TV; the difficulty of finding indigenous language channels such as S4C or BBC Alba; and even not being able to find the EPG itself on a smart TV.

There is very clear evidence that EPG positioning really matters. I will give just one example to illustrate it. If you look at the percentage of viewership of CBeebies on Virgin, where it is high up on the EPG, the share is much higher than the viewership of exactly the same programmes on Sky, where it is much lower on the EPG.

However, the real reason for my intervention is simply, as the Minister is about to respond to the debate, to draw his attention to what one of his right honourable friends—the former Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport—said just in 2011:

“Position on the EPG will probably be the Government’s single most important lever in protecting our tradition of public service broadcasting”.—[Official Report, Commons, 8/9/11; col. 543.]


When the Minister responds, I hope he will bear in mind what his right honourable friend said.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who contributed to the debate. I have to warn the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, that despite his very kind remarks I may not be so amenable. My speech may contain some upsetting content—we broadcasters have to issue warnings.

Amendment 226A would extend the prominence provisions that currently exist for linear channels to on-demand electronic programme services, which are the lists of on-demand services available for selection on television interfaces. This issue was debated at length in the other place, although I note that this amendment goes further in integrating new provisions into the existing statutory framework for both EPGs and the PSB prominence regime. But I believe that the key issue remains as it was.

The Minister reassured Members in the other place then—and I reassure the Committee today—that the Government gave this issue considerable thought during last year’s balance of payments consultation, the response to which was published in August last year. Our conclusion was—and we remain of the view—that we have not seen compelling evidence of harm to PSBs to date. Creating a new regulatory regime that defines the user interfaces or submenus that should be caught, particularly in a fast-moving technological landscape, is likely to be complex. At the time of consultation, Ministers were not convinced of the benefit of regulation that might extend to, for instance, smart TV manufacturers’ user interfaces, which are developed with a global market in mind. We therefore decided not to extend the EPG prominence regime for PSBs to on-demand.

When PSBs make excellent content, generally audiences will find that content. This is true of both catch-up and live content. For example, the BBC’s award-winning children’s services are much viewed by children throughout the UK. We do not believe that further protections are necessary to ensure that children find these services. A recurring theme in the debates on the Bill has been how much more competent children are than many adults in the digital world.

Furthermore, acting in this area is extremely complicated and the fact that the amendment spans more than a page demonstrates some of the difficulties inherent in legislating in this area. The technological landscape is shifting quickly and, with it, the business models of those who seek to cater to changing audience tastes. Detailed regulations about how exactly audiences need to be guided through menus cannot be the answer here. Regulations would be outdated as soon as they came into force.

Moreover, this amendment would give prominence to the PSBs’ on-demand programme services, which include not only the PSB content of the commercial PSBs, but also content originating from their non- PSB channels. If the intention was to put on-demand EPG prominence on the same footing as linear EPG prominence, this amendment goes far beyond what we have in place for linear TV. It is therefore, in our view, not justifiable.

With that explanation—and I appreciate that the noble Lord may not be happy—I hope that tonight he will withdraw his amendment.

Digital Economy Bill

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Wednesday 8th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, this amendment deals with the preparations that will need to be made should we be in the unfortunate situation that was animadverted by Sir Brian Leveson when he finished his part 1 report, if the press self-regulation proposals made in it are not fulfilled.

The current situation is complex, and it may be slightly premature to assume that everything is going to fail, but I think that, of the two types of problem that he identified, the first—that no recognised regulator was appointed within a year of the recognition panel’s being established—has not come through. We have a recognised regulator, and it was approved very recently, within a year of the recognition panel’s being established. That is a good thing, and we should bank on that.

The second problem, however, remains. His feeling was that there would be no value in the self-regulatory proposals he was advocating if significant news publishers remained outside the recognised regulator. That has happened in spades. There is a body established by the industry and largely for the industry, IPSO, which is not seeking recognition under the existing procedures. Therefore, that would, I think, represent a failure in terms of Leveson’s original proposal. We also have a situation in which the recognised regulator is not attracting significant support from the press which might be regulated by it, although it does have some support, and that is good, and we support that. It is not, however, operating at the scale or encompassing sufficient of the broad press, which was the focus of the original report, to be considered a success.

We are facing a problem. The problem was anticipated, and the solution proposed by Lord Justice Leveson at that stage was a backstop regulator. Therefore this amendment—which is limited in terms of the exact wording to the digital media, although it could, I think, be read as more appropriate for the wider situation—is almost certainly going to be required because of the situation I have outlined. Obviously, we regret that. We wish, as we always have, that a properly self-regulatory system could be established. However, it is extraordinary that the press, as Lord Justice Leveson says, benefits from considerable support in statute for the activities that it wants, including a provision in an amendment to this Bill to protect journalists who wish to break stories that were in the public interest and who might otherwise be caught by concerns about data leakage. That is an example of the sorts of ways we have often legislated for and supported the press because everybody believes in a free press and believes that the press should be able to operate within the law and without any constraint. However, we also believe—this is particularly true of those who have been victims of press intrusion into their private lives—that the public will not settle for a situation in which the press escapes standards regulation altogether.

We will therefore face a situation within a few months where it is likely that it will not be possible that the Leveson proposals have been brought in and there is a need for a standards regulator. The standards regulator proposed by Leveson in his report is Ofcom, and there is much in the report which shows and explains why that would be a good thing. My amendment, which I hope the Government will accept, says that it is time to start to think about how this will impact on Ofcom’s work and to bring forward proposals under which that should operate. I beg to move.

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, it is four years after the Leveson inquiry, and I certainly believe that Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013 should be implemented, and should be implemented now. I voted for it in your Lordships’ House last October and I certainly support the amendments today, which have much the same effect. I also support the fail-safe amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, although I hope that it is not necessary and that Section 40 will be brought in.

Some incredibly misleading statements have been made about the impact of Section 40. Most of the newspapers, as we know, do not support its implementation and have featured some quite amazing one-sided editorials. To the best of my knowledge, none of them has permitted a right of reply. I am the former Member of Parliament for the wonderful city of Bath, which is included in my title, so I am sure that noble Lords will not be surprised that I take a particular interest and am an avid online reader of the Bath Chronicle. Three weeks ago it published one of these anti-Section 40 diatribes. I wrote a rebuttal and asked the Bath Chronicle to publish it. I have not even had an acknowledgement so far—so much for a free press.

Perhaps to explain why I support these amendments, and to ensure it is published—albeit in Hansard rather than in the Bath Chronicle—I will read what I wrote, because it sums up exactly where I stand:

“I am a strong supporter of local newspapers and the Bath Chronicle in particular. But I was surprised by your recent editorial suggesting that measures being considered by parliament will mean that ‘Any investigation in the public interest could be silenced by anyone with a vested interest’. This is a complete misreading of the proposals made by Lord Justice Leveson after the Public Inquiry which followed the appalling phone hacking scandal.


Few could deny that in the past the press had a shocking track record of setting up its own toothless regulators which failed to protect the public. Leveson has proposed that the press should now establish a truly independent regulator whose independence is checked and then ‘recognised’ by a body which is itself impartial and independent from government or the press.


This is what the public want as shown by a YouGov poll just last week. When asked ‘Do you think it is important that any newspaper self-regulator undergoes an audit to ensure it is effective and that it is genuinely independent of both politicians and the press?’ nearly three-quarters (72%) said yes and just 6% said no.


The ‘regulator’ under which the Bath Chronicle operates—called IPSO—doesn’t meet this test. It is not only funded but controlled by the newspapers it regulates.


Were the Chronicle to join a ‘recognised’ regulator, or were IPSO to demonstrate through getting recognised that it met proper standards of independence and effectiveness, the funding issues you describe would not happen. Moreover, the public would be protected and you”—


that is, the Chronicle—

“would receive protection from wealthy and powerful local figures if they tried to bully you into withholding stories about them by threatening you with unaffordable court costs”.

My article ended:

“I hope Parliament will agree to support the public and back Leveson’s proposals”.


I certainly hope the Government will accept the amendments before us today.

[The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Keen of Elie) (Con)]

My Lords, I am obliged to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, for expressing this amendment and also to the observations of the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath. I would say, with respect to his most recent comments, that the test of a free press is not whether or not they publish a letter. Indeed, the fact that they do not publish your letter is itself an expression of freedom.

Amendment 229ZC would require the Government to report to Parliament about the arrangements that would need to be made should Ofcom assume the responsibilities of an independent regulator of digital publications. I acknowledge the care with which the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, has drafted this amendment. He was quite candid in saying that his real concern is the regulation of the press, but he was equally candid in indicating that, in order to come within scope for the purposes of this Bill, he was not really concerned with all publications by the press but only digital publications.

I see in his amendment an expression of concern—and, indeed, of frustration—over the lack of progress being made towards a viable avenue for press regulation. I am sure that in a sense that, in part, has prompted this amendment. However, he said himself that it might be slightly premature. With respect, I would concur with that observation. It is perhaps too soon—and people will say in response, “Four years after Leveson, is anything too soon?”—but we have to remember that the press landscape has altered quite dramatically over the last four or five years. That is reflected in the fact that certain matters have gone out for consultation—particularly with regard to Section 40, which is going to be raised in a later amendment—albeit that the consultation process has been somewhat stymied by an application for judicial review.

I move on to the core of the present amendment, which is the idea that we should move towards—and this was a backstop of Lord Leveson’s report—Ofcom as a regulator. The idea that Ofcom should regulate digital publications—albeit with “digital publications” not being a defined term, and I make nothing of that—has behind it the real push that Ofcom should become the regulator for the press. As I understand it, that is essentially what lies behind the amendment.

Let us remember that Ofcom already has huge responsibilities as a regulator, many of which we have debated over the last week. Among other things, it has to ensure that we have fast broadband connections, competition decisions, such as the current consideration of the future of Openreach, which has been referred to, and spectrum management, including forthcoming auctions. We have also discussed today its new role in respect of the BBC and its function in managing listed events, and we have heard from my noble friend Lord Borwick in respect of Ofcom’s regulatory functions and in respect of subtitles and the accessibility of on-demand services. There is plenty more, over and above that, that Ofcom does, and that is without even going into the question of postal regulatory functions.

We have the greatest respect for Ofcom as a regulator, but the question arises about how much more we can put on its plate. This amendment seeks to pile on more. For the first time, it would be setting a regulatory requirement on Ofcom, in statute, in relation to internet content, which is not TV-like, if I may use that rather crude term. As my noble friend Lady Buscombe has already made clear, moving to a situation in which Ofcom is a regulator of a broad range of online content would be an enormous undertaking for Ofcom, or indeed for any other regulatory body.

Digital Economy Bill

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 6th February 2017 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Foster of Bath]

77: After Clause 29, insert the following new Clause—
“Copyright and the role of active hosts
(1) The Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 are amended as follows.(2) At the end of Regulation 19 insert—“(2) Where an information society service is storing and providing access to the public copyright protected works, and is playing an active role, including the promotion and optimising the presentation of those works, sub-paragraph (1) shall not apply.(3) The service provider of an active host under sub-paragraph (2) is required to secure licensing agreements with rightsholders.””

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 77, I shall speak briefly to Amendment 79. Amendment 77 probes the Government’s intentions with regard to the recent proposals for an EU directive on copyright in the digital single market. The amendment would clarify that the hosting defence contained within paragraph 19 of the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 does not apply to digital services that play an active role in the provision of online content, specifically those user upload services that optimise the presentation and promotion of copyright-protected works. The amendment would require those services to secure licensing agreements with rights holders.

To explain in more detail, many services are passive hosts, which are defined in EU law as those that provide a,

“technical process of operating and giving access to a communication network over which information made available by third parties is transmitted or temporarily stored, for the sole purpose of making the transmission more efficient”.

Examples would include internet service providers such as BT, TalkTalk or Virgin, cloud locker services such as Dropbox, Microsoft’s One Drive or Google Drive, and online bulletin boards such as HootBoard or MyBB. Services such as these are accepted as essential to the operation of the digital market and so quite reasonably have what is called “safe harbour protection”—that is, a limitation of their copyright liability on the basis that they have no knowledge of copyright infringement. On the other hand, there are sites that also give access to works made available by third parties, but actively provide functionality that promotes works, makes recommendations and optimises the upload for the purpose of presentation. It is this functionality that provides users with the ability to find what they want when they want it. These are active hosts. They directly compete with licensed providers. Examples include Facebook, YouTube, Dailymotion, Bandcamp, Vimeo and Metacafe. They should not have safe harbour protection and should be required to secure licencing agreements with rights holders.

Therefore, while there was, and in some areas continues to be, justification for exemptions for passive hosts, like all exemptions they must reflect the balance between the rights of rights holders and users. There is a strong argument that the existing provisions are not sufficiently defined and as a result are open to deliberate misinterpretation. This means that some services can use copyright-protected content to build their businesses without fairly remunerating rights holders. UK Music’s recent report Measuring Music highlighted that the user-uploaded service YouTube, the most frequently used global streaming platform and one that currently benefits from the safe harbour provisions, increased its payments to music rights holders by only 11% in 2015 despite consumption of the service growing by 132%. This further underlines what is called in the trade the “value gap”. The current legal ambiguity and imbalance has created distortions in the digital market with services like YouTube benefiting from these exemptions whereas Apple Music and Spotify, providing similar services, do not. The growing significance of the music streaming market must not go unremarked. Over a four-year period, the UK music industry has grown by 17%, and during the same period, there has been a massive shift from consumers owning music to streaming it. The value of subscription streaming services jumped from £168 million in 2014 to £251 million in 2015.

There has been a number of legal cases seeking to clarify the situation. In 2011, in the L’Oréal v eBay case, the Court of Justice of the European Union held that online marketplaces cannot benefit from the hosting exemption where they play an active role, for example by promoting and optimising content. This amendment seeks merely to clarify what should already apply in the law right across the EU, including in this country. However, some services are still arguing that they are not active hosts, and as a result, avoid licences or are underlicensed, hence the need for the clarification that may be provided by this probing amendment.

There is another reason why we need greater clarity from the Government. Initially, the Government made it clear that they believed:

“Clarification of terms used in the Directive would, we believe, help to address … concerns”,


about the active/passive host issues. However, in a letter to the EU institutions in April last year, the then intellectual property Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, argued in relation to digital services that,

“we should avoid introducing legislation that might act as a barrier to the development of new digital business models and create obstacles to entry and growth in the European digital market”.

This probing amendment seeks to ensure that that sort of view does not preclude strong and robust positions being taken in support of safe harbour clarification. The proposals in the draft EU directive in this regard are welcome, and we ask that the UK Government continue to support the clarification in the law that the draft directive seeks and that they continue to engage in this important process.

The referendum result and the path towards Brexit raise many issues in relation to these proposals. It is highly conceivable that we will be Brexiting at the very time that Europe begins to adopt copyright rules for the digital age, so an opportunity to clarify UK law will be lost as a consequence of other factors. It is therefore necessary to consider how we can take this opportunity of having a Digital Economy Bill to safeguard these important principles once we leave the European Union. I hope very much that the Minister will confirm that the Government are committed to implementing the draft directive, and Article 13 and Recital 38, into UK law, if they are not implemented by the point that we leave the European Union. Finally, I am well aware that the Government have been consulting stakeholders on these issues. I hope we get a commitment from the Government to publish the consultation and that the new IP Minister, Jo Johnson, will commit to a meeting with representatives of the music industry and others to discuss these issues.

Briefly, we on these Benches fully support Amendment 79 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, which my noble friend Lord Clement-Jones and I have also signed. I have no intention of stealing the thunder of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and will leave him to explain the importance of the amendment, which seeks simply to help the Government achieve their own manifesto commitment to reduce copyright infringement and ensure that search engines do not link to the most offending sites.

I will say merely that the Government have already hosted a number of round tables to seek ways forward, and some sources are telling us that a voluntary agreement for a code of practice is close to finalisation. If that is true then I am delighted to hear it, but this amendment would not preclude a voluntary agreement. Already many have argued to us that tabling the amendment may have helped to speed up the process towards a voluntary agreement with teeth, but the amendment would not do anything other than ensure that we had a backstop mechanism in the event of a failure to get a voluntary agreement or if the voluntary agreement fails. I hope that on that basis Amendment 79 will also be considered seriously by the Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, on Amendment 77, over recent years the UK has made great strides in the enforcement of intellectual property, and we are now judged to have one of the best IP enforcement regimes in the world. This is definitely a position that we are keen to maintain, and the Bill sends a clear signal that the Government believe copyright infringement is a serious matter, irrespective of whether it is online or offline. This includes measures to increase the penalty for online copyright infringement from two years to 10 years. We understand that there are concerns in the music industry particularly that online intermediaries need to do more to share revenues fairly with creators, which the amendment seeks to tackle. However, we need to find balanced solutions that provide clarity without undermining basic freedoms or inhibiting the development of innovative digital models.

As the e-commerce directive is EU single-market legislation in origin, we will in effect have to wait until after we exit the EU and then possibly initiate a debate as to whether this regime, or indeed the e-commerce regulations as a whole, is still fit for purpose. We are also wary of making piecemeal changes to this important regime that has helped to foster the development of online services and has been helpful to the development of the UK’s burgeoning tech sector without a proper debate involving all parties.

That said, the current law, including the exemptions from liability, has fostered an open and innovative internet, giving online services the legal certainty required to start up and flourish. This has been good for creators, rights holders, internet businesses and consumers alike. Platforms, like all businesses, have a role to play in helping to remove copyright-infringing material, and there is no place for a system that encourages copyright infringement online. However, the UK Government are fully committed to ensuring that our creative industries receive fair remuneration for their work. We want to see creators remunerated fairly, while encouraging investment in new content and innovative services. We will carry forward these principles when engaging at policy level with the EU while considering our own UK-based solutions.

The Government are clear that we must maintain our rights and obligations as members of the EU until we leave. That means that we carry on making arguments within the EU concerning our preferences for EU law. Once we leave the EU, we may choose to reconsider a range of issues, including the limited liability regime, but for now, government policy remains unchanged. The European Commission has recently published a series of copyright proposals in that area, and we are in the process of carefully considering those proposals. While we remain a member of the EU, we will continue to engage with policy development in this space, alongside considering the development of our own copyright framework.

Amendment 79 would mean that the Government take a power to impose a code of practice on search engines, to dictate how they should work to prevent copyright infringement. The return of that suggestion, which was also discussed in another place, gives me an opportunity to update noble Lords on progress in this important area. Since the idea was last discussed in the other place, IPO officials have chaired a further round-table meeting between search engines and representatives of the creative industries. While there are still elements of detail to be settled, the group is now agreed on the key content of the code and I expect an agreement to be reached very soon. All parties have also agreed that the code should take effect, and the targets in it be reached, by 1 June this year. The search engines involved in this work have been very co-operative, making changes to their algorithms and processes, but also working bilaterally with creative industry representatives to explore the options for new interventions, and how existing processes might be streamlined. I understand that all parties are keen to finalise and sign up to the voluntary agreement, and so we believe there is no need to take a legislative power at this time.

Surely it is better to act on a co-operative basis now, and start tackling this serious issue right away. If, however, a voluntary deal cannot be achieved, we will re-evaluate our options. I hope therefore that the noble Lord is reassured, and feels able to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Foster of Bath]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response. On the second amendment, my concern is that although she is optimistic that we will have a robust agreement in place, if that does not happen—or if the agreement breaks down at a future date, for whatever reason—she has said merely that the Government will re-evaluate their position. She will be as aware as I am of the difficulty of bringing new legislation before your Lordships’ House to address any decision they might make at this time. The amendment would provide that backstop mechanism if it is needed in the long run, which is why I hope we will have an opportunity to discuss that at further stages of the Bill.

On the first amendment, the Minister has not been able to reassure me that the Government are committed to introducing appropriate legislation if the EU legislation has not been finalised at the time we leave the European Union. I hope therefore that we will have an opportunity to discuss that matter in more detail on a future occasion. For the time being, however, with an opportunity for us to reflect on what the Minister has said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 77 withdrawn.

21st Century Fox Takeover Bid for Sky: Timetable

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I am obliged to my noble friend. It will be a matter for the parties to determine the appropriate competition processes that will apply to this merger, and it will be for the Commission and the CMA to confirm when a formal notification has been made. I am aware that the 2011 bid from News Corporation, involving the acquisition of Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia, was both considered and approved by the Commissioner in terms of competition provision.

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, last week I asked the Minister whether the Government intended to follow the recommendations of Lord Leveson, in his recommendations 83 and 84, regarding the transparency of meetings between the relevant parties and government Ministers—in this case Murdoch executives. The Minister said at that time that the Government had no intention of following those recommendations. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, however, he has just said that minutes will be kept of any such meetings and notice of those meetings will be given. Could he go that extra step and say to the House today that, in addition, the content of the matters discussed in such meetings will be made public?

21st Century Fox Takeover Bid for Sky

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord for repeating the Statement made in response to an Urgent Question in another place. I think a lot of people were concerned to hear last Friday that 21st Century Fox had struck a deal for the total takeover of Sky. Five years ago, a similar bid was abandoned after the Murdoch family and their friends and News Corporation were engulfed in the eye of the phone-hacking storm.

The concerns of 2011 were not just about the serious wrongdoing that was being uncovered by the phone-hacking scandal. They were also about the concentration of media power in fewer and fewer hands. I note that the noble and learned Lord has confirmed that the Secretary of State has power to intervene in certain media mergers on public interest grounds, as set out in the Enterprise Act 2002, and we look forward to having further details about that. I further note that the guidance makes clear, as the noble and learned Lord said, that the Secretary of State will aim to take an initial decision on whether to intervene on public interest grounds within 10 working days of formal notification of a merger to the relevant authorities and such formal notification has yet to be received. We will see how this matter transpires.

There is also the question of whether James and Rupert Murdoch—if they are to acquire the balance of Sky—are fit and proper persons to be licence holders of a regulated television service such as Sky. This is a matter for Ofcom. Last time round, had the bid not been withdrawn, I am sure the noble and learned Lord would agree that it is highly unlikely James or Rupert Murdoch would have passed this test. A lot of water has passed under the proverbial bridge since then, including confirmation of illegal activity, illegal payments and phone hacking in organisations controlled by them. Will the Minster confirm that this fit and proper person test is urgent and that Ofcom needs to attend to it forthwith?

[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

My Lords, we too want to see public interest and fit and proper investigations before any merger is given the go-ahead. We certainly do not want to see an American-style Fox News in the UK. We also need to know what the Government are up to to ensure that they are—as the Minister said they intend to be—scrupulously fair. I have one simple question. Given the numerous meetings that have taken place between government Ministers and Murdoch executives and the recent meeting between the Prime Minister and Rupert Murdoch, do the Government now agree that they should implement Lord Justice Leveson’s recommendations 83 and 84 immediately so that minutes are kept of such meetings and the content of the matters discussed made public?

[Lord Keen of Elie]

My Lords, I will respond first to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, on the fit and proper person test. Under the Broadcasting Act 1990, Ofcom needs to be satisfied that a holder of a broadcasting licence is a fit and proper person. That is entirely a matter for Ofcom. On a change of control, Ofcom may consider the issue but will do so only once the transaction has been completed.

With respect to the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, of course the process of dealing with this transaction will be fair and will be carried out, as I indicated before, by the Secretary of State discharging a quasi-judicial function. There is no present intention to deal with the matters in Leveson that the noble Lord refers to. As regards his suggestion of a recent meeting between the Prime Minister and Rupert Murdoch, I point out that the only recent meeting was in September, when the Prime Minister was attending a meeting with certain journalists and correspondents from the Wall Street Journal and Mr Murdoch arrived unannounced, as it were, at that meeting. I can advise the noble Lord that there was no discussion at that time of the present transaction.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that question. He has had constituents come to him about this extremely difficult issue and I have had exactly the same experience in my constituency. Although previous Governments had put arrangements in place, there was a basic unfairness, particularly towards those who caught hepatitis C, because the evidence about what happens to people with AIDS and hepatitis C has changed over the years. I was pleased that my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary made the statement last week that we would increase what was being given to those suffering from hepatitis C. I am not sure that there is ever a level of payment that will bring closure for such an appalling accident, but I believe that the conditions in this country were different from those in other countries that campaigners often compare it with, such as the Republic of Ireland. I think we have the right answer.

[Mr Don Foster (Bath) (LD)]

Q7. The mobility component of disability living allowance for people in care homes is being reviewed. Whatever improvements are made, will the Prime Minister assure me that disabled people in care homes will still have access to individually tailored mobility support, and that that will be, as the coalition agreement implies, at no extra cost to them or their families?

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful for my right hon. Friend’s question. The intention here is very clear: we want to ensure that the treatment of people in hospital is the same as the treatment of people in residential care homes in terms of the mobility component of DLA. That was behind the announcement we made, and that is what we want to make sure happens.

Summertime (Scotland)

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[David Mundell]

Quite the contrary. The hon. Gentleman and those who support the campaign have to win the argument with the public in Scotland, with the body politic and with civic society.

[Mr Don Foster (Bath) (LD)]

Just to clear up the issue, will the Minister agree to place in the Library all the information to which he has referred, which enabled him to make the claims that he has just made?

[David Mundell]

As the hon. Gentleman will understand, it is not possible to set out that information in the way that he seeks. What is possible is for those who support the change, such as the hon. Member for Glasgow South, to make their case and win the argument with the people of Scotland. He was very careful not to say that he was speaking on behalf of people in Scotland, because he knows that there is not majority support for the change in Scotland at this time. Rather than argue about polling evidence, which all of us in the body of Scottish politics know is amazingly unreliable, he should concentrate on winning the argument in Scotland if it is what he truly believes.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Mundell]

That is another interesting suggestion. I was going to agree with the hon. Gentleman’s point about the change in wintertime and the fact that the change in October is so much closer to the shortest day than the change in the spring, and that is a live issue that people mentioned to me when I was in the Western Isles 10 days ago. We must also recognise that for people living in the Western Isles and the most northerly parts of Scotland, such a change would have a significant impact on their lives in winter when daylight would not come before 10 am, and that cannot be just glibly set aside.

[Mr Foster]

Given that the Minister is very keen for there to be more accurate data on this information and on having an informed debate, will he make it clear that he and his Department will support the Bill’s getting a Second Reading, so that that further research and informed debate can take place?

[David Mundell]

That will be a matter for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills during the course of the debate, which is to be held on 3 December. I hope that all those Members with an active interest in this matter will ensure that the debate explores all the issues that cannot be explored in the short time that we have available this evening, and that those people who promote the view will continue to gather the evidence that they believe will support their conviction that the benefits of lighter evenings would outweigh the costs of darker mornings. Judging by his contribution, that is the sort of informed debate that the hon. Member for Glasgow South wants to move to, and we would welcome that in this Parliament and in the Scottish Parliament.

Secondly, a consensus within Scotland will need to be built, to convince the body politic, Civic Scotland and the Scottish public to support them. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Cathy Jamieson) might tell me to the contrary, but I was unaware that the Scottish Labour party in the Scottish Parliament supported such a measure and had promoted it by speaking actively in its favour. I might have been wrong in that regard.

The hon. Member for Glasgow South highlighted the important issue of road safety and made some telling points. Thankfully, the UK already has one of the best road safety records in Europe, but the UK and Scottish Governments recognise that we can always do more. The introduction of central European time is not a panacea in that regard. Road safety experts acknowledge that other initiatives could have a greater impact. Indeed, even proponents of change acknowledge that the change may result in more road injuries in Scotland during the morning peak.