AI and Creative Technologies (Communications and Digital Committee Report)

Lord McNally Excerpts

Friday 13th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord McNally (LD)]

My Lords, I hope we will see the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, here for the wind-up, because there is a wicked old habit in the House of Commons of intervening very early in a debate to which you have not put your name, so you are in Hansard but you can then be on the train home.

My thanks go to the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, not only for her introduction today but for her chairmanship of this committee, of which I have been proud to be a member. It is the third such report that the committee has brought about under her stewardship, and it is a good example of how Select Committees can carry out programmes of work that are essential in working through legislation.

I am pleased to see the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, in her place, and I look forward to her speech. This last week, which is coming to an end, has been a bit bruising. I have never been a fan of ping-pong; I do not think it is the best way of getting a resolution. We thought some 20 or 30 years ago—but you must not rush things in the Lords—that we should adopt the approach of the American Congress: when they get stuck on a piece of legislation, they appoint a joint committee with the task of bringing forward a solution.

I also share the wish of good luck given by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, to the noble Lords, Lord Evans and Lord Massey. My only caveat is that I see that the noble Lord, Lord Evans, has chosen a Yorkshire designation for his title, when he was born in Lancashire. Such apostasy is noted.

The noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, has given us a good start by looking forward and not brooding over the past. I am afraid that I have now reached the stage in my career where I do brood over the past. It is about 60 years since I first came to be interviewed for a job in the Fabian Society by the late Arthur Skeffington. I have worked in and around this place ever since. What struck me in preparing for this debate was that I was much inspired in my late teens and early 20s by two speeches. The first was John F Kennedy’s inaugural speech. He announced that

“we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty”.

The second was Harold Wilson’s on 1 October 1963, when he called for a new Britain “forged in the white heat” of a technology revolution. I call attention to them today to draw a comparison between the upbeat optimism of a period when a US President could call on the best instincts of an outward-looking and generous-spirited country and the narrow self-interest of today’s incumbent. In the 1960s, we were still living in a post-war settlement made by that “never again” generation, but the very title of the report we are debating today, Less Talk, More Action, suggests a judgment on the Government’s strategy very far from the vision and sense of urgency contained in Wilson’s white heat of technology speech. The whole thrust of the report, and the dissection of it today by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, is to urge on the Government clear objectives and urgent decisions.

The challenge is clear. The changes now in train brought about by AI are as great and fundamental as those brought about by the first industrial revolution 400 years ago. Yet there is a worrying one-sidedness about the Government’s AI strategy, as they navigate a path between the tech firms’ freedom to exploit their technology regardless of any harm inflicted on the creative sector and creatives who fear for their livelihoods if the fruit of their hard labour is freely available for commercial exploitation.

Those fears are well founded, as the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, reminded us. In the case of the creative industries, AI presents a real dilemma which needs a considered and rational response from the Government to a difficult question: how do we protect the intellectual property rights of creators while encouraging responsible innovation and investment in the development of AI? In this House during the passage of the Data (Use and Access) Bill, we tried very hard to offer constructive and workable solutions, but the Government have repeatedly demurred, and ping-pong, as I have said, is not the most efficient way of making progress on complex legislation. It does not help that the Government have during these debates increasingly given the impression that their main objective with that Bill is to convince not the House of Commons or the House of Lords but another house altogether—the White House.

In fact, the Government’s approach during ping-pong brought to mind the great Tommy Cooper in pulling various rabbits out of the legislative hat—none of which remotely resembled a rabbit that could reassure the creative sector. Nevertheless, one of these rabbits may yet have some life in it if, and only if, the Government demonstrate a genuine determination to arrive at a solution that is in in the interests of the creative industries as well as of the tech companies. I refer to the proposed parliamentary working group. One of the most constructive periods in a long parliamentary career was my time on the Puttnam committee leading up to the Communications Act 2003 and the creation of Ofcom. That too was also under a Labour Government with a large majority, but that Government showed their willingness to listen to a knowledgeable, cross-party committee making constructive recommendations, with an independent chair trusted by all sides. The committee must not be a fig leaf which the Government exploit to force through their own proposals in the face of opposition from the creative industries.

As I suspect we will hear later, this is not just about the creative industries. My full title is Lord McNally of Blackpool, and this morning I received a very persuasive brief from the mayor’s office in Blackpool on Blackpool and the Fylde coast’s bid for an AI growth zone. As well as the specifics of AI in terms of culture and creative industries, there is a real possibility of AI being used as an engine for growth. As the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, warned us, it is an opportunity that if we do not take we will pay for it at our peril.

We need an imaginative regulatory intervention which satisfies both rights holders and big tech companies. I believe the Select Committee has played important part in informing this debate and this report sits well with its predecessors. It has been right in reminding us that AI is not a sector but a technology and that it must find its place in a coherent, cross-government vision that can drive innovation across all eight of the Government’s key growth sectors.

Queen’s Speech

Lord McNally Excerpts

Tuesday 27th June 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord McNally (LD)]

My Lords, I think that all parts of the House wish Northern Ireland well. A number of speeches today have been made by politicians from Northern Ireland and those with experience of it.

The electorate’s decision not to give the Prime Minister the parliamentary equivalent of a blank cheque means that the Government need to make a genuine attempt to make a success of cross-party co-operation across a range of the policies under discussion today. Leaving the EU will require not only the great reform Bill but an estimated 10 to 15 other Bills to create new policy frameworks in areas that are currently governed by EU law. That will not be achieved by the Government sanctimoniously invoking parliamentary conventions or trying to bully or intimidate this House.

My noble friend Lord Tyler will deal with these matters in more detail but, like him, I was a member of the Cunningham committee on conventions, which reported in 2006. For me, the committee’s most important finding was that, in rare and exceptional circumstances, this House must retain the right to say no. Without that right, although it has been rarely used over the past 70 years, we become a debating society and the House of Commons becomes what the late Lord Hailsham described as an elective dictatorship. I urge the Government really to address the problem and the need for co-operation between the parties to get this massive amount of legislation through properly. The Hansard Society says in a briefing note that it sent today that it is about to publish a range of proposals on how the matter may be dealt with properly and in an orderly fashion. I urge the Government to grab with both hands the initiative by that society and to involve all parties in taking it forward; otherwise, we will have a car crash.

Like others, I regret the omission of the prisons and courts Bill from the gracious Speech. I have great admiration for the new Justice Secretary, David Lidington. Like the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bristol, I think that the Justice Secretary’s open letter on the matter, published on 21 June, was a welcome assurance that penal reform has not disappeared from his radar. I hope that he will note the great wave of positive good will that greeted Michael Gove when, as Secretary of State, he positioned himself as an out-and-out prison reformer. As the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, indicated, legislation is not always required to take forward penal reform.

Fortunately, Mr Lidington does not have to look far for good ideas. There is the Corston report on women in the criminal justice system; the Laming report on looked-after children; Dame Sally Coates’s suggestions on education in adult prisons, which my friend Lord Dholakia mentioned; and the parallel report about education in the youth justice system by Charlie Taylor, my successor as chair of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales. There is the report by the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, on the experiences of young black and Muslim men in our criminal justice system, with a further report from David Lammy MP expected in the autumn. There is the report by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, on deaths in custody and the report by the noble Lord, Lord Bradley, on mental health provision in prisons and the criminal justice system. All those excellent reports are brimming with good ideas, many of which do not require legislation. What is needed is a Secretary of State to give impetus, direction and leadership, and I hope that David Lidington will provide that.

There are also areas where the House can give that impetus and leadership. I am pleased that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, has already tabled a Question on the backlog of IPP prisoners. I look forward to supporting my noble friend Lord Dholakia in the passage of his Bill to raise the age of criminal responsibility to 14.

I welcome the announcement in the gracious Speech that a commission for countering extremism and a counterterrorism strategy review will be established. I was pleased to see the news that the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi, had been involved in discussions on those matters. It is absolutely essential to hear the communities’ voices in mapping the way forward in both areas and to avoid undermining the counterextremism work by creating counterterrorism powers that act as recruiting sergeants for extremism because things are being done to, and not with, the communities involved. My noble friend Lord Paddick gave that warning.

A hung Parliament is not a disaster; a disaster is when the election result produces a Government that, while claiming to be strong and stable, are simply arrogant and unwilling to listen. That is the bullet that we dodged on 8 June.