Digital Economy Bill

Tom Brake Excerpts

Tuesday 13th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

If my right hon. Friend will allow me, I will come on to that later in my speech.

As well as reforming land rights, the Government are reforming the planning system. I think that my right hon. Friend was referring to that. The Minister for Housing and Planning will shortly introduce regulations to ease the installation of vital masts to fill not spots. The Bill will ensure that the planning reforms introduced in 2013 for five years, for poles and cabinets, can be made permanent.

The radio spectrum—the invisible resource on which all modern technology relies—will be better managed to ensure that we maximise capacity and avoid interference and that the UK is ready for the arrival of 5G, the future of mobile connectivity. We will lead the world on that, thanks to this Government’s £11.6 million investment in the innovation centre at the University of Surrey.

As well as access and infrastructure, the Bill will tackle harm online. First, our manifesto pledged to protect children from online pornography. Children now spend more time online than watching television, and one in five children recently surveyed had encountered pornographic images that had upset them.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I of course support the Government’s intention to protect children from inappropriate content, but does the Secretary of State agree that compulsory, age-related sex and relationships education in our schools must be central to protecting children?

[Karen Bradley]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an important point about having age-appropriate and good-quality sex education in schools, as I very much advocated during my previous job in the Home Office. However, we need to be clear that we have an incredible problem of pornographic images being available to children. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children reports that children as young as seven are being treated for addiction to pornography. This cannot be addressed through one measure alone, but the measures in the Bill will help. There is no silver bullet; a joined-up approach across the whole Government is needed to deal with it. I hope that he agrees that as we age-classify films, restrict age-inappropriate broadcasts to after the watershed, put age-inappropriate magazines on the top shelf and keep children out of sex shops, so equivalent and proportionate measures are needed online.

The Government have already made good progress on this subject. Frist, since 2013, public wi-fi is automatically filtered and pornography is blocked in many places that children regularly visit. Following agreement with the Government, the four largest internet service providers offer their customers family-friendly filters, which, since last year, are now turned on by default. The Bill now goes further. Pornographic websites will be required to have adequate age verification, which is equivalent to what the gambling industry already implements. The regulator will pass on details of the non-compliant to credit card companies and other service providers to enable them to withdraw business support. We will drive cultural change in the sector to ensure that children are protected.

Secondly, we will protect consumers from nuisance calls. The Government have already taken steps on this matter. In May, we required direct marketers no longer to withhold their caller identification information, so that consumers can see the number of who is ringing. The Information Commissioner seeks to enforce the law, and we will help her further by placing the direct marketing code on a statutory footing, so that penalties stick.

Thirdly, we will help to protect businesses from attacks on their intellectual property. Burglars can be sentenced for 10 years in prison, but the criminal gangs making vast sums of money through exploiting the online creations of others only face a two-year sentence. We will increase the sentence to 10 years. Criminals such as Paul Mahoney, who profited by almost £300,000 and cost industry millions by facilitating access to illegal films on the internet, need to be sent a clear message. We need to ensure that enforcement agencies and their partners have the right set of tools to tackle all types of piracy, which is why those measures are so important. We will make it easier to register designs, cutting costs for our creative industries while increasing protections.

As we build our digital economy, investing in infrastructure and empowering citizens, the Government must transform and become more digital. The Government want to use and manage the vast amounts of information we keep better. Let me be clear that that is not to develop some Big Brother state that sees and knows everything. We want to manage information better for the same reason that shopkeepers, farmers, insurers, car manufacturers, educators—practically anyone in our economy who has ambition—do. Quite simply, we want to deliver better services—to create, to improve and to deliver in the public interest, for the citizen’s benefit.

The Bill will allow public services to be targeted and delivered better. If one arm of the public sector knows who needs a service and the other arm is trying to deliver that service, the two need to be brought together, to work for the public benefit. Of course, we are doing that already in many places, but often only after legislating to enable specific data-sharing arrangements. All that takes time—time we do not have and can now save because of the Bill.

As the private sector knows well, information is a mineable commodity, from which value can be extracted. That value to the Government will come in better decisions, based on quality research and statistics. The Bill will allow us to spot problems and grasp opportunity for the benefit of everyone.

We will shortly be publishing the draft BBC charter for the next 11 years. My right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) led one of the largest and most open consultations ever conducted, and the new charter will provide the foundations for a stronger, more independent, more distinctive BBC that will inform, educate and entertain for many years to come.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chi Onwurah]

Yes, all sizes, as well.

We know that the International Trade Secretary believes that our businesses are lazy, but I know many that are cutting a swathe through the internet, as opposed to the golf course. Greater connectivity can help businesses to work on the move or to use new workspaces rather than traditional ones. We are also seeing new types of work, new products and markets, and digital tools that help current businesses to be more effective. Whether it is farmers relying on GPS to guide their tractors or start-ups using blockchain to address financial inclusion, digital infrastructure, tools, skills and platforms are the building blocks of the British economy.

The good news is that we are a great digital economy—indeed, we are Europe’s leading digital economy. We are only at the start of the digital revolution, with the internet of things, big data and artificial intelligence set to transform the way we live and work. Now is definitely the time to bring forward a Bill to set out the vision and policies to place the UK at the top of the global digital economy. Sadly, this is not that Bill. TechUK, the digital sector trade body, described it as fixing some basics. That was rather generous. The Bill is an excellent example of that old “Yes Minister” trick of putting the difficult part in the title so it can be ignored in the document itself.

There are some good measures in the Bill, so let me begin with those. First, the universal service obligation is a long overdue half-step in the right direction. The last Labour Government left fully costed plans for universal broadband coverage by 2012. [Interruption.] I am afraid that is the truth. Members may not like it, but it is in the documents—I helped write them. The Conservatives’ bungling procurement process and total lack of ambition left many behind, particularly in rural economies. The National Farmers Union and the Countryside Alliance have been vocal in highlighting the Government’s shortcomings so I will add only that it is an absolute disgrace that in 2016 there are still people in this country—one of the richest in the world—who cannot even download an email.

We also welcome some movement on digital consumer rights; making it easier for consumers to switch between mobile, landline, broadband and TV providers will empower them. We are glad that the Bill gives Ofcom the teeth to ensure that customers are automatically compensated for poor service, but we also want it to be given the resources to make sure it can deliver on that—here I make another declaration of interest, as a previous employee of Ofcom.

We also welcome increased protection for children against pornography, something many on the Opposition Benches have campaigned for tirelessly. We will seek in Committee to improve the practicality and effectiveness of the measures proposed. Parents need to be given more information about protecting their children. Critically, there needs to be compulsory sex and relationships education in our schools, so that we can teach young people about healthy relationships. I heard the Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee calling for that this morning.

[Tom Brake]

I agree that denying children access to online pornography is essential, as is ensuring the privacy of adult users of legal adult sites, and ensuring that the Government’s solution works. Does the shadow Minister have a clear idea of how the Bill deals with foreign sites and free sites?

[Chi Onwurah]

The right hon. Gentleman raises two very important points. There is no clear idea of how the Bill deals with such sites, in particular sites for which no commercial payment is made. There are also privacy issues throughout the Bill. That is one area on which we will seek to work in Committee.

A 21st-century economy needs the infrastructure to deliver a digital economy, so reform of the electronic communications code is long overdue. Frankly, I am very glad the Government have finally begun to build on Labour’s Communications Act 2003. We are concerned, however, that proposals to lower base station rentals may reduce even further the revenues to funding-starved local authorities and we want to hear how the Government will protect them. Newcastle City Council, for example, stands to lose £300,000 a year, which could go to social care, transport and the skills training my constituents rely on.

We also welcome proposals to bring aspects of our copyright law into the 21st century, rewarding artists and our creative industries for the huge contribution they make to our economy. Again, we shall seek to test in Committee how effective the proposals will be in practice.