Confirmed: Lib Dems and Conservatives force web blocking into the Digital Economy Bill

Jim Killock, 03 March 2010

copyright Despite firm warnings from ourselves, Consumer Focus and others, Liberal Democrat and Tory peers Lord Clement Jones and Howard pushed through an amendment allowing the courts to order web blocking for ‘substantially infringing’ websites.

Later today, protests prompted a public justification of the approach from Clement Jones, on LibDem Voice which got torn apart, mostly by fellow Liberal Democrats.

Thus we are faced with an appalling sight: on the one hand, Labour, pushing Clause 17 as a means to ‘future proof’ copyright against new infringement, and on the other, the Lib Dems and Tories, pushing an approach likely to produce straightforward threats, bans and withdrawals of sites with user generated content.

We will be asking to meet the Liberal Democrat and Conservative front benches. We will let you know if they can find time for us.

Take action

In the meantime, you should take action yourself. You should write to your local paper, about the disconnection proposals, and these new measures for web blocking and backdoor censorship, and make this a national political debate. And if you haven't already, join ORG.

Alix

Re: Confirmed: Lib Dems and Conservatives force web blocking into the Digital Economy Bill
Reply #3 on : Wed March 03, 2010, 21:40:34

I would just like to point out that Liberal Democrat members posting on the relevant article on Lib Dem Voice today are mostly very unhappy with this action by our parliamentarians. I think it's fair to say there's a degree of overlap in membership between organisations like ORG and the Lib Dems (similarly NO2ID, PEN etc), which makes this amendment baffling from a political point of view, as well as wrong from a liberal one.

An emergency motion at our forthcoming spring conference is now under discussion along with other means of exerting internal pressure. It's not clear at the moment what the aim will be - the amendment has been passed in the Lords and the bill is at a late stage. There are not many obvious options open to us at this point.

Jim Killock

Agreed
Reply #2 on : Wed March 03, 2010, 21:49:40

Alix, you are absolutely right of course. It'll be great to hear about any emergency motion - we can help suggest options.

Richard Gadsden

Emergency Motions
Reply #1 on : Wed March 03, 2010, 22:51:59

Any debate on an emergency motion will be Sunday, 14 March at 9:15 am - almost certainly live on BBC Parliament.

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