Queen’s Speech — House of Lords, 2015-06-04
Topic: Mixed Topics
Timothy Francis Clement-Jones (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft. I agree with much of what she said These debates are often much more about what is not in the gracious Speech than what is in it, especially in the context of business and the economy. The UK’s creative industries have been one of the great success stories of the past five years. Significant policies benefiting these industries were developed during the coalition Government. I pay tribute to Vince Cable for all his work as the Business Secretary I want to see creative businesses continue to thrive across the whole country so that our economy can continue to reap the benefits. It is vital that we do not lose the momentum. Will this Government build on the achievements of the last? That is the question. I welcome the fact that both the Minister and Ed Vaizey are Ministers shared jointly now by DCMS and BIS to ensure that creative industry policy is fully joined up. To maintain that momentum we need to encourage clustering of creative businesses developed through alliances between central government, local authorities, universities and the private sector in our major cities. Our cities and many counties need greater powers, especially over finance. I therefore welcome in principle the proposed cities and local government Bill as part of the Government’s northern powerhouse strategy. I add my welcome to that of others to the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, whose presence in government is so welcome and whose passion for delivery of the northern powerhouse strategy is so apparent The noble Baroness and Ed Vaizey represent valuable continuity for the sector. I welcome John Whittingdale to his new role, with his enthusiasm for intellectual property and live music in particular, and his background of 10 years as Culture, Media and Sport Committee chairman. I am sure that a brief spell for Sajid Javid at the DCMS has given him a useful insight into the fundamental relationship between the arts and our creative industries Many noble Lords have talked about development of digital skills being vital. Expansion of digital platforms has highlighted the growing convergence of creative content and the tech sector. Skills in the arts and sciences are increasingly drawn together. Will the Government promote the value of creative subjects in schools and ensure that they are rewarded for offering a broad and balanced curriculum? The number of apprenticeships created and taken up in the creative industries has expanded hugely in the past few years. I hope that they will enhance the co-ordination of action on skills by merging the two skills councils, Creative and Cultural Skills and Creative Skillset, into a single powerful and effective body. Will the Home Office break the habit of a lifetime and ensure with BIS that the tech and creative industries are able to fill the gaps in high-end skills, from abroad if necessary As we have heard today, our broadcasters are the linchpin of the creative industries and there are some key questions in that regard. Will the Government maintain Channel 4 in public ownership? Will they follow up the consultations started in March on Section 73 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, which requires public service broadcasters to give away their most valuable product—their channels—to the pay-TV cable platform in the UK, and repeal it? We had a mini debate on the BBC today and contributions on the BBC were made yesterday. Under John Whittingdale’s chairmanship, the Culture, Media and Sport Committee produced a valuable report on the future of the BBC with many useful observations and recommendations, including on governance and extension of the licence fee to iPlayer-only users, which can, and no doubt will, be taken forward into the charter discussions—and so too, I hope, will the committee’s views on the need for open and transparent discussions on the charter. Will there be a full and open debate on any decriminalisation proposals and will the potential financial cost of such a policy to the BBC be fully recognised? We need strenuously to protect the independence of the BBC. Currently, the licence fee is the best way of doing that. However, that does not mean that it needs to rise faster than inflation Investment in the UK’s creative industries can only really make a difference if their intellectual property rights, particularly those relating to the protection of their online materials, are properly understood and enforced. It was good to see the acknowledgement in the Conservative manifesto of the importance of intellectual property and of proper behaviour by search engines. However, I was rather baffled by some of the statements in the manifesto. It says: "We will protect intellectual property by continuing to require internet service providers to block sites that carry large amounts of illegal content" I do not recall that we were able to persuade the last Government to bring in any legislation to do that. The legislation remained unenforced on the books, so I think there are questions to be asked about that. Is it not crucial that we should educate consumers on the importance of intellectual property and support initiatives designed to get voluntary agreement from the advertisers and credit card companies not to advertise on infringing sites? Will the Government continue to support the long-term funding of the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit, or PIPCU, which carries out such vital work? Will they increase sanctions relating to online offences in line with the recent government review of penalties for online copyright infringement, Penalty Fair I regret that we shall spend the next two years arguing about membership of the EU. I hope that, at the same time, the Minister will find time to work with our EU partners to ensure that proposals for copyright reform as part of the single digital market proposals do not damage our creative industries by limiting territorial licensing I very much hope that the Government will continue discussions with artists and creators on extending the law governing unfair contracts to include intellectual property contracts. I very much hope that, when possible under EU law, the application of public lending rights to remote e-lending will be extended I have little time left but I very much hope that the Government will continue to promote the value of live music despite the powers created in the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act, which are already being used disproportionately. I agree 100% with the noble Baroness, Lady Liddell, and with the comments made by my noble friend Lord Lee yesterday, on the importance of our tourism industry, which so far, even after five years of the last Government, has been treated as a Cinderella and holds such promise for job creation in the years up to 2020. Time will tell. I look forward to future debates and discussion on all these policy areas.