Parking (Code of Practice) Bill

Debate between Bob Stewart and Pete Wishart

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 23rd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I think 50% of MP4—[Interruption]—sorry, 75% of them are in the Chamber. Perhaps they will give a rendition before the end of the debate. Can I check, whatever we agree, that the measure will apply in Scotland, and the Scottish Parliament will back it?

[Pete Wishart]

Absolutely; it is important that that happens. At the beginning of his speech, the right hon. Member for East Yorkshire mentioned that a legislative consent motion has been passed in the Scottish Parliament to ensure that this Bill covers Scotland and that those aspects that require this House to legislate on behalf of the Scottish Parliament are secure. Every part of the Bill applies to Scotland, so it will be national, which is important for many of the fine English visitors who come to my constituency and enjoy the delights of Perthshire. They will be protected if they park in my constituency, and will have the same rights of appeal and process as everyone else.

Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill

Debate between Bob Stewart and Pete Wishart

Wednesday 7th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

As we discuss counter-terrorism for a fifth day, our thoughts are very much on the appalling murders in Paris today. It was not only an appalling attack on journalists and a newspaper office but an attack on free speech, and today all of us can say, “Je suis Charlie”. Given those sickening events, it is pretty hard to discuss counter-terror measures today, but we live in a democracy and we will discuss them. We will not let any terrorist attack deter us from our influence on the matter or how we approach our business.

We are eternally grateful for amendment 12, because it is the beginning of a recognition of Scotland’s distinct responsibilities for measures under the Bill. The Bill asks that we be consulted on competencies for which we are actually responsible. It is not consultation that the Minister requires, it is our consent. We are responsible for delivering those competencies in the Scottish Parliament. We are responsible for education and health, we have a distinct legal system, and we are responsible for the judiciary. The Scottish police force, Police Scotland, is accountable to the Scottish Parliament. We have our own institutions and our own set of responsibilities and competencies. Yes, we are grateful that the UK Government are going to pick up the phone and consult our Ministers, but it is our consent that they require when passing measures under the Bill.

We will agree with the Government on most measures, and I am sure we will get on perfectly well, but we take a different and distinct approach on a number of issues. Of course we do—we have a different culture in Scotland. We do not have the same size of ethnic communities as there are south of the border, and we have a different and distinct approach to community relations. We see and deliver some things very differently from the UK Government.

The vast platform of the Prevent strategy will be administered in Scotland by Scottish public bodies, responsible to the Scottish Parliament and under the guidance of Scottish Ministers. Consultation—great. Thank you ever so much, Home Secretary, for being prepared to consult Scottish Ministers, discuss things with them and maybe even ask their views, but what we need is to give consent. If we are to be realistic about the devolution settlement and the range of responsibilities we have, and if we are talking about the respect agenda, that consent is required. Consultation is certainly not good enough.

Our approach to Prevent is different, of course. We see it more through the lens of safeguarding, with an emphasis on keeping people safe, community cohesion, participative democracy and ensuring that action is consistent with the needs of, and risks to, all our communities.

[Bob Stewart]

I cannot see any difference between that and what is proposed in the Bill. Those are exactly the same measures that everyone in this country wants to see instituted.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but there are differences. They may just be nuances to him, but we take them particularly seriously in Scotland. For example, we work with key sectors in Scotland, such as the NHS, further education, the Prison Service and local authorities. Prevent also benefits from input from Police Scotland’s model of community engagement and from the strength of the relationship between various arms of the community and all the public services in Scotland. The key point is that we perhaps look at the cultural context differently.

What we are keen to do in Scotland—and we have had a great deal of success—is ensure that a sense of Scottish citizenship is given as quickly as possible to new immigrants, particularly from south Asian communities. That has been incredibly successful. We talk about the “bhangra and bagpipe” culture in some of our larger communities, especially in Glasgow, and we are particularly proud of that. Believe it or not, most Scottish Asians supported Scottish independence because they saw from their historical experience, and from being a colonial power or being part of the empire, that independence was not a scary issue. They were able to join us to ensure that such transformative change—

Intellectual Property Bill [Lords]

Debate between Bob Stewart and Pete Wishart

Monday 20th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

The hon. Gentleman is spot on. So much more could be done through educational initiatives. I have seen some important work being done. I have visited schools and seen schoolchildren trade marking their work with the little copyright symbol. They were starting to appreciate that what they produce, even if it is just a drawing, has an intrinsic intellectual value. If we can get across the message that intellectual property is as important as a property right, and if we can encourage that culture, we will be making great strides forward.

It has been reported in recent weeks that the creative sector has grown by 8.6% in recent years, compared with growth of only 0.7% in the general economy. It is the UK’s fastest growing sector and is worth around £71 billion a year. As the Culture Secretary has said, so much of our cultural and creative endeavour rests on important intellectual property rights, which is absolutely spot on. It is the creative industries that are growing us out of recession. Imagine growing our economy on the back of the creativity, talent and imagination of the people of this country. What a fantastic way to grow our economy. That is why it is so important that we get the intellectual framework right.

We have not done too much that is wrong over the past 10 years. The UK remains a leader. We are in the top three countries in practically every cultural discipline, whether music, film, television, publishing or whatever. We must be doing something right. It also comes naturally to people in these isles; we are just naturally creative. That is reflected in the great output we have seen over hundreds of years, in our contribution to invention, talent and creativity. We get something right and we are able to protect it, so we have to be very careful as we progress with intellectual property rights. We tamper with that at our peril. We have to be careful about how we progress.

The genesis of the Bill was in November 2010, when the Prime Minister made his great “Googlesburg” address. I remember coming home one evening and being unable to believe what I was seeing on the television: a UK Prime Minister talking about intellectual property. It was the first time I had seen a UK Prime Minister take an interest in intellectual property, which was great. I was also interested in what he was saying, because I wondered what on earth he was going on about. His basic premise seemed to be that we would never see a Google emerge in the UK because of our restrictive intellectual property laws and copyright framework. He did not say whether it would be a good thing to have a UK Google. The clear thing he said was that we would not be able to create a Google in the UK, and he also said something about our IP rules being restrictive and that they needed to be fixed.

I do not know who was advising the Prime Minister at the time, but it was certainly not the hon. Member for Hove (Mike Weatherley), who is now his adviser, because I know that the hon. Gentleman would never advise him to say such nonsense about the need for a Google to emerge in the UK—he would have advised him to say something much more sensible and measured. Was there perhaps somebody close to Google working at No. 10? Was somebody in a personal relationship with somebody working at No. 10 and advising the Prime Minister? I will leave that question hanging. Thank goodness the hon. Member for Hove is now advising him much more sensibly on such matters. [Interruption.] I see the Whip, the hon. Member for Devizes (Claire Perry), nodding her head. I will return to Google later, because there are lots of important things to be said about that. We have to understand what that has all been underpinned by and the impact and damage that type of process is having.

The Prime Minister then dispatched Ian Hargreaves to solve the Google conundrum. Ian Hargreaves rightly dumped all the Google nonsense as soon as he could. He went to the United States to see if he could introduce the American system of fair use into UK law. When he was prohibited from doing so because of very sensible European legislation, he moved on to the substance of his review by looking at IP’s economic contribution. He came up with 10 recommendations—some good, some bad, some indifferent and some repetitive—that the Government were minded to accept.

Since then, throughout the Hargreaves process, we have been in the business of legislating for those 10 recommendations. Some have required primary legislation, such as the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013, and some have required secondary legislation. We are yet to see the statutory instruments, because the Hargreaves process has not concluded. We have this Bill and the SIs are coming forward. One thing that I would like the Minister to tell us—he can intervene now or answer when he responds—is what on earth is happening with the SIs for the rest of the copyright exceptions. He will probably say that they are still with parliamentary counsel and that they are not yet ready to be presented. Well, he had better get a move on, because he only has until March to do it.

I would like to hear about the process for introducing the SIs and what we should expect. I strongly suggest—several Members have said this several times to various Ministers—that we have separate SIs for each of the copyright exceptions. As a matter of principle, it is right and proper that we should be able to assess each of the exceptions individually. It would be unacceptable to bundle them together on a “take it or leave it” basis, particularly the new exceptions, and there are some really important ones, such as parody, copying and all the other ones—I cannot remember what they are, but the Minister knows what I mean. We have to ensure that we see them separately and debate them properly when they come through.

We are getting close to the end of the Hargreaves process. Has it been good? Yes, some of it has been all right. The digital copyright exchange is fantastic—a great little innovation. That part of the process has worked. However, there is a lot of nonsense—stuff that we did not need. In fact, great unhappiness has been caused among many people who represent our creative industries, because when they came to the Government stating their strong concerns about some aspects of Hargreaves they were arrogantly dismissed as though they—the people who have built the success of the industry—did not understand the environment they were working in and the Government or Hargreaves knew it better. There was a great deal of dissatisfaction among people who felt out of sorts with the way the Government went about this business. I hope that if we have a process such as this in future we will be able to look at things much more circumspectly and take everybody with us as we go forward.

I want to make a few remarks about how the Bill has been handled. It is an absolute disgrace that the House of Lords looked at this matter first: it should have been elected Members in this House. Given the value of the role that IP plays in industry and business, we should have considered it first, and if the House of Lords then wanted to look at it and suggest amendments and things we should reconsider, that would have been absolutely fine. Something as important as intellectual property and its contribution to the economy should have been handled first by directly elected Members rather than the House of Lords, talented and well respected as some of its Members may be. It should have been our right and our responsibility.

The Minister responsible for IP is an unelected Lord himself. The hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Jim Dowd) was spot on in his comments. The Minister is anonymous. Not even the Prime Minister could remember his name, so what chance have the rest of us got? It is great that the Minister for Universities and Science is here—who better to have dealing with a Bill on intellectual property than a Minister with a multiplicity of brains?—but the real IP Minister should be taking this Bill forward and held accountable through the questioning of this House’s directly elected Members.

That unelected Lord is a Minister in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, which is responsible for the Intellectual Property Office despite the fact that the IPO deals with matters looked after by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. All the disciplines that the IPO manages and supports are covered by the DCMS, but the IPO is covered by BIS. Is anything as ridiculous as that? Surely we should be trying to bring this together, as suggested by the all-party intellectual property group. I see some of my fellow officers here; the hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge is its secretary. DCMS would be the perfect fit for the IPO in ensuring that it could work beside all the industries it is there to support. I hope we can resolve this issue.

The all-party group also suggested that we should have an IP champion. If this is going to work cross-departmentally, we need somebody out there banging the drum for IP-supported business and industry. That is the great forgotten in all this. There are people here who are passionate about IP and recognise its value and importance, but the place should be mobbed—full to the gunwales. This is about billions of pounds and we have to get it right. The problem is that we have an anonymous Minister in a Department that does not serve the industry. We must get this fixed. We should make the hon. Member for Hove our IP champion—an IP tsar who is out there getting things sorted out. He was right to mention the IP tsar in the United States, who is doing a fantastic job. When the all-party group met her, we were all very impressed with the power and clout she has on Capitol Hill to get things done. That is what we need in this country—somebody who will work cross-departmentally to get things resolved and make sure that we are able to take this key matter forward.

On the Bill itself, I do not want to be repetitive—[Interruption.] Come on, let me get this properly into context. We have heard all about the sorts of things that the Bill does. It is great that it covers registered design rights—the great forgotten IP right. It is fantastic that ACID has at last got its way and that this will now be covered by criminal infringement provisions, but it is totally wrong that unregistered designs are not covered too. In the House of Lords there was a big debate about this on clause 13. There has also been a debate within the industry whereby a consensus has developed that if we are to pursue the idea of registered design rights, unregistered design rights must be included. The vast majority of people who work in the design industry are in small or micro-businesses with probably fewer than four people working for them, and they cannot spend so much time making sure that things are registered. We must get this resolved.

[Bob Stewart]

I have listened carefully to the arguments about unregistered designs, and I wonder how this matter can be policed. How will that be possible when no one has actually said “This is my design” and someone has agreed with them? That is really worrying.

[Pete Wishart]

ACID has built up a database of unregistered designs, and tens of thousands of people have registered with it. If that can be achieved by a small organisation such as ACID, which runs so efficiently and effectively with Dids Macdonald and her very small staff, surely the UK Government can do likewise, and that is what we are asking them to do. It is absolutely right to make sure that our design industry is properly looked after in this regard. I welcome any progress on patents and designs, but we need decisive leadership, not another piecemeal Bill that does the absolute minimum that is required.

I did not expect to be raising a constitutional point in relation to these issues, but the unified European patent court could seriously affect Scotland’s ability to judge and make rulings on patent issues within Scotland. As the Minister knows, under the new European regime every member state is allowed four divisional courts. We know there is going to be one in London, because the Government have said so, but we do not know where the other three will be—if there are three; they have not said how many they have chosen to have. One of them has to be in Scotland. We cannot have our economy suffering because our inventors and creators in small businesses have to leave their jurisdiction to secure justice and satisfaction elsewhere in the UK or further abroad. After centuries of looking after these issues, this ability must be available to the Scottish judiciary. The Minister has probably seen the letters from the Law Society of Scotland and the Faculty of Advocates in Edinburgh, who are very worried that we could be diminishing or getting rid of not just decades but centuries of experience in dealing with patents according to Scots law. We must make sure that the Court of Session in Edinburgh becomes one of the divisional courts of the new unified court.

Voting Age

Debate between Bob Stewart and Pete Wishart

Thursday 24th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

No, I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman as we do not have much time.

I am immensely proud that it is Scotland that is leading the way in delivering the franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds, and that the Scottish National party Scottish Government are the first Government in the United Kingdom ever to allow our youngest people the vote. In our independence referendum 16 and 17-year-olds will be able to decide the future of our country, and that is absolutely right. This is an immensely exciting and transformative event and it is the right thing to do.

The Scottish National party has supported votes for 16 and 17-year-olds for decades. Winnie Ewing, who was our first Member of Parliament, spoke about the franchise for 16 and 17-year-olds in her maiden speech in 1967. We believe that 16 and 17-year-olds have the biggest stake in our future and it is right that they have a say. I will not go over the reasons why 16 and 17-year-olds should get the vote, as those reasons have been eloquently put by several hon. Members. If people of that age can marry, pay tax and join the Army, they should be given the opportunity to decide the future of the country, and it is what the people of Scotland want, too.

Of the 26,000 people who responded to the Scottish Government’s consultation “Your Scotland, Your Referendum”, the vast majority agreed that 16 and 17-year-olds should be allowed to vote in a referendum. In fact, 56% agreed and 41% disagreed. Children 1st, Children in Scotland, the Educational Institute of Scotland, the Electoral Reform Society, the National Union of Students in Scotland, the Scottish Youth Parliament, the Scottish Trades Union Congress, Unison and Unite—all bodies that have an interest in young people and their welfare and rights—responded positively to the proposal to allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote in Scotland’s referendum.

We can allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote in the referendum because of the Edinburgh agreement, reached between the UK Government and the Scottish Government, which passed responsibility on all issues related to our referendum to the Scottish Parliament. It is the first time we have had the opportunity to be responsible for a franchise for a national election—and, by God, we are going to use it.

The Scottish Parliament has already legislated to give 16 and 17-year-olds the vote in health board elections and in the crofting commission elections. Where we have legislative responsibility, we will allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote. Unfortunately, we do not have responsibility for UK elections. We are not responsible for the franchise for elections to the Scottish Parliament. We are not even responsible for the franchise for local government elections.

It has been ridiculously suggested that because we cannot allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote in UK Parliament elections, we should demonstrate our right to allow young people to vote in our referendum. I am sorry, but we are for votes for 16 and 17-year-olds. We believe that it is right that they should get the vote, and where we have responsibility we will allow our young people the vote. We will not be held back by some of the positions of the Westminster Conservatives. If we were to wait for the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) to agree to 16 and 17-year-olds having the vote, we would be waiting a long time.

What are we going to do? The Scottish Government are going to bring forward a Bill to allow all 16 and 17-year-olds to register and vote in our independence referendum. We propose to accelerate the paving Bill, which will allow a canvass of 15 to 17-year-olds as part of the electoral canvass plan for 2013, not just the so-called attainers covered by the existing electoral canvass proposals. We are already working closely with electoral registration officers and other stakeholders to develop the legislation and the practical arrangements to implement it. We will guarantee and ensure that all 16 and 17-year-olds have a vote in the Scottish independence referendum.

What has been disappointing about the debate on votes for 16 and 17-year-olds in the independence referendum is the attitude of parties and politicians who notionally support votes for 16 and 17-year-olds. I respect the hon. Member for Bristol West (Stephen Williams), but his Liberal colleagues in Scotland have been what could only be called prickly, oppositional and generally grudging about trying to secure votes for 16 and 17-year-olds in the independence referendum.

In fact, our consultation showed that 17 Labour Members of Parliament objected to 16 and 17-year-olds getting a vote in the referendum, as did practically all the Liberal Democrats. I find that astonishing, and even shameful. If they believe that 16 and 17-year-olds should be able to vote in all elections, why did they not support their right to vote in the referendum in the Scottish Parliament? It was immensely disappointing to see the Liberals, in particular, opposing and being prickly and difficult about securing votes for 16 and 17-year-olds in our referendum.

The fact that 16 and 17-year-olds cannot vote in general elections has been mentioned, but we cannot do anything about that, because we do not have responsibility for extending the franchise in UK elections. Some have tried to suggest that we are proposing votes for 16 and 17-year-olds for narrow party political advantage—what a lot of nonsense. There is no evidence to support that claim. In fact, one opinion poll conducted among 16 and 17-year-olds showed that a majority were in favour of remaining in the Union. To suggest that we are doing this for narrow party political advantage is absolute and utter nonsense. The attitude of some of the parties that notionally support votes for 16 and 17-year-olds in the referendum has been disappointing. They will have to account to 16 and 17-year-olds when the referendum takes place in Scotland next year.

[Bob Stewart]

Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that 16 and 17-year-olds could be on a jury in a murder trial, for example? I am slightly concerned about that.

[Pete Wishart]

I do not agree with that. This goes back to the debate that has been well rehearsed and which we have heard so much about today. There are different ages of responsibility between the ages of 16 and 18. There are certain things that 16-year-olds can and cannot do, there are certain things that 18-year-olds can do, and there certain things that people cannot do until they are 21. We sometimes have to draw a line when it comes to these issues, but to say that 16 and 17-year-olds should not be able to vote when they have such responsibilities and such a stake in our society and community is utterly perverse, wrong and bizarre. Of course they should get the vote.

I am a sponsor of the motion and so will, of course, support it. I will continue to support every effort in this House to ensure that we get votes for 16 and 17-year-olds. I make a plea to both the Liberal and Labour parties to stop their opposition to votes for 16 and 17-year-olds in the Scottish referendum and to please help us to deliver it to ensure that we have the first national referendum in the United Kingdom in which 16 and 17-year-olds can vote. Support us, help us, and we will deliver it.