Digital Economy Bill

Lord Clement-Jones Excerpts

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

This is one further step on a number of issues that I would genuinely ask the Government to look at. We need to strengthen the requirements for ticket sellers on to the platform. Yesterday my noble friend made the good point in closing that we do not want to have numbers on each and every ticket because some are sold in blocks while others might be for a small pantomime in a Bury theatre. The truth is that the Committee is not asking for that. We are asking that where an event organiser has provided a number on the ticket in the first place, the secondary market should be required to put that number on the advertising on its website so that it can be checked. I am grateful to the Minister for highlighting that point and I hope that my response will allow him to think yet further about how we can put in place just a small number of additional measures to strengthen the legislation in order to protect consumers, to absolutely get rid of bots and, from a personal point of view, to pay respect to my lamented and absent noble friend this evening, Rachael Heyhoe Flint.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lords, Lord Stevenson and Lord Moynihan. I shall speak to Amendment 231 and express my support for Amendments 230 and 233B to 233E. Despite the lateness of the hour, I hope that the Minister will not mind my adding my tribute to the late Baroness Heyhoe Flint. She will be greatly missed, and it was moving to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, had to say. In a sense it is a complete loss not to have her here today to speak to these amendments because we know that she would have made a passionate case for all of them, so we are here to help move forward this campaign. I am a member of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Ticket Abuse. Together with other noble Lords, I debated these matters on the Consumer Rights Bill and I feel strongly that we must move on from where we are today. I want to make a few comments in connection with the amendments for that reason.

The market in ticket resale is some £1 billion per annum across music, sports, theatre and comedy, and it is a very lucrative business. There is increasing evidence that it is a market manipulated by touts. We have listened to the egregious examples given by the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan. Fans who want to buy tickets for the events that are most highly in demand are systematically directed towards platforms like viagogo, StubHub, Get Me In and Seatwave, where scalpers and bot users are able to operate anonymously and bulk-sell inventory at hyped-up prices. Another example to add to those already given is the latest in a long line of victims: Ed Sheeran fans attempting to buy tickets last week for his upcoming UK arena shows. I looked at the ticket listings for his concert at the O2 on 2 May and counted almost 1,500 tickets for sale across Get Me In, Seatwave, StubHub and viagogo, all for prices way over face value, with service fees in excess of 20%.

Ed Sheeran has publicly condemned ticket touts and before these shows went on sale he carefully communicated to his audience to buy only from authorised ticket agents. He also appointed a resale agent to enable fans to transfer tickets at face value, yet touts still infiltrated the sale. No wonder people are so angry: they feel the system is rigged. An industry campaign, the FanFair Alliance, is fast gathering support, and I am very grateful to it for helping brief us all for this debate. Fans themselves are petitioning the Government. More than 33,000 have signed a parliamentary petition in the last week, begging politicians to tackle this issue. Of course, we have debated this in Parliament. The Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee held a short inquiry which came to the conclusion late last year that action was needed. The committee chair has described ticket touting as “a national scandal” and a massive racket which is making people in the industry millions, while exploiting genuine fans who just want to pay a fair price to attend live events.

The noble Lords, Lord Moynihan and Lord Stevenson, mentioned the report undertaken for the Government by Professor Michael Waterson, which raised major concerns. He made nine recommendations to the Government, yet here we are eight months later and despite some encouraging words in the other place, particularly about bots, the Government have yet to respond. Legislation, even the inadequate legislation we managed to get the Government to agree to on the Consumer Rights Bill, is still not being enforced. All the secondary ticketing sites that I mentioned still operate without a shred of transparency. How many more members of the public will be ripped off before the Government decide to take action? There is clearly an urgent need for government intervention in this market, to push forward the handful of decisive actions which are all reflected in the range of amendments being tabled today.

We know that the amendment on bots is similar to the one put forward in the House of Commons, and I want to add the name of Sharon Hodgson to that of Nigel Adams, because she has played a major role in the campaign in the other place.

[Lord Moynihan]

I am very grateful to the noble Lord for giving way because it gives me the opportunity of declaring my interest as co-chair with Sharon Hodgson of the all-party group. I echo the view that without her extraordinary energy, a lot of the cross-party support in another place would not have been secured. We should recognise that as an important contribution today.

[Lord Clement-Jones]

I thank the noble Lord for that. I will not go into the detail—it has been very well described by the two noble Lords—but measures to criminalise the use of bots were implemented last year in New York, and have since been extended to many other states. Why should the US have better legislation that we do? At a minimum, we would like to see similar legislation implemented and enforced in the UK.

I should speak very briefly to Amendment 231, because it is in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath. This amendment would give artists and event organisers greater control over who is authorised to resell their tickets. It would add to the Consumer Rights Act 2015 a provision requiring online secondary ticketing platforms to resell tickets only for events where they were the authorised resale agent. I realise, of course, that it needs further work—it probably does not quite deliver the purpose for which it was intended—but it does have very considerable support in principle, particularly, interestingly, from the Society of London Theatre and UK Theatre, both of which have written to express their support. It would place further control on the UK secondary ticketing market, putting the power back into the hands of the promoters of events to control their own ticketing by allowing resale only via authorised secondary ticketing websites, in a similar way to how an event organiser currently appoints a primary ticketing agent or agents. This amendment would allow them, if they chose to, to also appoint a secondary ticketing agent or agents to enable ticket resale. This is an important measure that, if we get the drafting right, could have a major impact.

All the measures contained in these amendments are what most sensible people would view as pragmatic steps that should help protect consumers without any real risk of unintended consequences. The only losers will be the touts. Why should audiences in the UK get anything less than the best protection? I hope that the Government will continue to move forward in this area and listen to the arguments being made. Quite apart from responding to the amendments, I very much hope that the Minister can give us some idea of when the Government will respond on Waterson—it is high time that we had a proper answer on those recommendations. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I agree with the noble Lord on that. The fact is that the enforcement activity is under way. We think it would be the wrong time, but I hope later to be not entirely discouraging.

[Lord Clement-Jones]

I am sorry to press the Minister further even at this late hour, but I do not quite understand. Presumably there is a conclusion to the review of the enforcement activity by the CMA, saying whether the enforcement activity is adequate, effective or whatever. Is there a timescale associated with this CMA review?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I am afraid I do not know what the timescale is. Obviously there will be a conclusion, but I do not know at the moment. I will find out and let the noble Lord know if it is possible to know that.

To add to the Act now while the investigation is under way would serve only to undermine it. We must allow the CMA to carry out its investigation without interfering with the law it seeks to enforce. To do so will simply provide further grounds for those being challenged to resist.

I also have some specific grounds on each of the individual amendments, but in view of the hour, if the noble Lord agrees, and in view of what I hope I will say to help him, if I omit those details on the individual ones we can move on. I understand the aim of these amendments—to ensure compliance with the Consumer Rights Act—but this is already under way and we must await the outcome.

On Amendment 230, concerning the use of ticketing bots, the offences set out in the Computer Misuse Act have broad application. Unauthorised use of a computerised ticketing system may give rise to breaches of that Act. We are of the view that it may also constitute an offence under the Fraud Act. Professor Waterson believed that such breaches need to be reported and investigated. He puts the onus on ticket vendors to guard against the harvesting of tickets by persons with no intention of attending the event. He called on the ticketing industry to do more to protect itself and, with government support, the new National Cyber Security Centre is in touch with ticketing organisations on cybersecurity.

Professor Waterson also stressed the importance of having an effective strategy that deters bot usage. For example, paperless options such as mobile phone ticketing, or a bank card doubling up as a ticket, can make it harder to carry out mass ticket purchasing. Notably, this strategy was employed for the sale of tickets to the musical “Hamilton” in London.

The Government understand the spirit in which these amendments are made and the Secretary of State recently held two round tables specifically on the issue of bots. While noting there are a number of industry-led solutions available, we recognise it is hugely frustrating for fans who miss out on tickets sold on the primary market only to see them disappear on the secondary ticketing market at sometimes hugely increased prices. That is why we will continue to reflect on what has been said by all noble Lords regarding the Government’s response to Professor Waterson’s report, which will be published very soon. Furthermore, we will continue to consider the specific issue of bots and whether there is scope for further government intervention in this area. I hope to be able to update your Lordships on this shortly. With that commitment, I hope noble Lords will feel able not to press their amendments.