Fairbrother Russell: Copyright (New Technologies and Performers’ Rights) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Fairbrother Russell: Copyright (New Technologies and Performers’ Rights) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
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RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER (Labour) 
: 
 It is my pleasure to speak on the second reading of the Copyright (New Technologies and Performers’ Rights) Amendment Bill. This is important legislation if only because it updates an Act that is now 14 years old. In our digital age an Act that is 14 years old is aged indeed because when the Copyright Act was originally passed in 1994 the Internet was just a babe in arms; it was a concept that was not used much in this country. The term “Internet service provider” was strange to most people but those providers are now part of the daily bread and butter of most people in this country from about the time they turn 7. 
The Copyright Act achieves a very fine balance between the need to protect intellectual property and the need to enable access to it by people who would benefit from developments of the human mind. The bill maintains that balance in the Copyright Act 1994 between protection and access which has stood the test of time. But what the bill does is meet the challenge of the emerging technologies. We see this a little bit in the debate over section 88 which the original bill repealed. The Commerce Committee considering it at a tangential approach reinstated it. I think it will now be repealed by way of a Supplementary Order Paper. It deals with cable programme services being retransmitted without the permission of the broadcaster. The concern of the Commerce Committee seemed to be that free-to-air television in remote areas would be affected by that. The Supplementary Order Paper will address that. 
This bill has a common-sense approach to the difficulties of Internet service providers. They cannot monitor all the time all the content that goes through their gateways but once they are on notice that there is infringing material it is incumbent upon them to take steps to remove or block that infringing material. This is what is known as “notice and takedown”. Once Internet service providers are reasonably on notice that there is an infringement of copyright then they must react in a way to protect the copyright. If they are not aware then they are immune from prosecution and other steps that could lead them into a situation of being answerable. 
On a wider approach intellectual property in New Zealand is an area of law that is still emerging. There are specialists on it and there are one or two textbooks on intellectual property. It is a fecund area of the law that is ripe for development and copyright is one of the earlier types of intellectual property in the development of our law. Copyright is often misunderstood; people think they need to take out some form of patent or whatever but copyright occurs when one asserts ownership of a particular piece of intellectual property. The assertion of ownership is often sufficient to satisfy the copyright requirements. Assertion of ownership can be in many forms such as a declaration that the property is an original work or the adoption of the copyright symbol © which we are all familiar with or another form of assertion of property. Copyright is one of the more fundamental property rights we have in this age of technological and intellectual development. 
This bill updates the 1994 Act. It does not seek to change the basic concepts therein but it certainly brings the matter quite fairly and squarely as the select committee acknowledged into the 21st century. One can only speculate that in 15 years’ time for reasons that are not apparent to us today there will need to be further changes. We always think that things that are modern and exciting today will be modern and exciting for all time. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Like Bob is! 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: Back in 1994 before people knew of Clayton Cosgrove he was modern and exciting and we are all now excited by his presence and the way he will lead this Labour Party to successive years of good governance by following the pattern of our present leadership Helen Clark and Dr Michael Cullen. On this side of the House we have considerable confidence in the intellectual ability of Clayton Cosgrove. In fact we assert copyright over the Minister. We think he is a product of this great Labour Party. He is taking on the terrible people in the Real Estate Institute with great courage. He went through the Weathertight Homes Resolution Service like a dose of salts and gave everybody the trots and the Hon Shane Jones is now picking up that role like absorbent toilet paper. We have now turned Clayton Cosgrove on to the real estate agents. By our adopting our good friend Minister Clayton Cosgrove we are asserting our copyright over his intellectual property. I know that some on the other side would say there is not a lot of intellectual property there but I simply say that Clayton is one of the biggest secrets out there. Until one is faced with the intensity of his concentration one cannot appreciate the depth of the intellectual property contained in that up-and-coming Minister. I look forward to serving 20 more years in this House under the future leadership of Clayton Cosgrove. 
I go back to the Copyright (New Technologies and Performers’ Rights) Amendment Bill. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: What about Ruth Dyson and Darren Hughes? 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: I am happy to talk about Darren Hughes. It is a change for him not to talk about himself. I think I should have a chance to talk about him as a bit of light relief. I was approaching retirement when my friend Darren was going to school. 
We see in this copyright bill strange terms such as “format shifting” and I ask members of the House what they understand “format shifting” to mean. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: It’s the National Party policy process! 
RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER 
: That could well be correct except that would be “formats shifting”. “Format shifting” is the sort of thing this bill works on. It is a term used in the music industry. It is tackled by this amendment bill which aligns the law with the public’s needs so that we can protect our domestic artists and we can encourage the cultural industries and pursuits in this country. 
That makes me realise that in the time of this Labour Government the amount of work by local artists being played on our radios has multiplied considerably. I remember—say in 1999—that we would be lucky if 10 percent of air time was taken up by local artists. These days if we pick up almost any radio station we will hear sooner than later a local track by a local artist and we will hear that artist being praised as though he or she earns a place in the pantheon of artists across the world—and this country is much the better for it. 
The Minister responsible for this bill the Hon Judith Tizard also happens to be the Minister responsible for bringing our local artists to the fore on the airwaves and her promotion of local music and local content is one of the benchmarks of this Government which encourages intellectual development and the creative industries. People often laugh at the creative industries; people often underestimate how important they are. Creative artists in this country are not bound by the pursuit of the dollar; in fact their lifestyle often denies the importance of money. A strange synergy occurs in that they produce works of art of considerable value with the fruits of that value often denied to the artists themselves. When we reflect that so many of our artists die in a state of poverty but the ultimate owners of their works live in a state of considerable richness it underscores the importance of these concepts of intellectual property which reduced down to their basic essentials find their way into the bill that is before us today. 
So without wanting to delay this matter at all or to cover matters that are not relevant to the bill I simply want to say that this bill is part of the wider reform process to ensure that intellectual property legislation is up to date and relevant and takes account of international developments. As members of the House will realise we cannot have intellectual property and copyright in isolation. Copyright is essentially a tool of the global market and we must be ready to protect our own artists from the influences of the global market. We must be able to protect that which we produce and to market it across the world and that requires the vehicle of an amended Copyright Act 1994. 
Although this Act has spent only 14 years on the statute book it is increasingly featured in our litigation and case law is building to reflect that. This amendment is timely and brings in the new concepts. I imagine that in 10 years’ time there will be a need to further amend it not because of deficiencies in the select committee work or deficiencies in the bill now before us but because the changing landscape of the intellectual and creative sectors will demand that this House be responsive with amending legislation. I am delighted to speak on the second reading of this legislation tonight and I commend it to the House.