Digital Economy bill still needs work, say Lib Dems

Bill will still be subject to scrutiny and more voting before important sections become law

Next parliament will scrutinise the bill further, say Lib Dems

Important parts of the Digital Economy bill will still need parliamentary consent to be legally enforceable, according to the Liberal Democrats.

Because of lack of time before the election, this consent can only be given by the new parliament.

Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate Bridget Fox published a letter from Don Foster, Liberal Democrat shadow secretary of state for culture, media and sport, on her blog, outlining the party's views on the Digital Economy bill.

Even if the bill is passed, Foster says: "it will only be the start of a long process with many stages and many more opportunities for scrutiny."

"Controversial parts of the bill will need to be scrutinised and voted upon by the next parliament before they can be brought into law," he added.

In the letter, Foster said that “technical measures” such as suspending illegal users of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing sites or reducing their bandwidth speeds should not be possible unless:

1. Copyright infringers are notified by letter without any risk of their internet connection being affected, for at least a year.

2. An evaluation of the effectiveness of such “soft measures” is undertaken.

3. An evaluation of the need for, and likely effectiveness of, technical measures has been completed.

4. Further communication between the ISP and user has taken place.

5. Proposed legislation is brought before parliament for decision, and

6. Any process to disconnect users explicitly assumes their innocence until they are proven guilty.

Foster also explained why the Liberal Democrat Party altered its stance on the Digital Economy bill's plans for blocking P2P web sites involved in illegal file sharing.

He blamed the limited time for consultation and said that because of this: " [We] do not believe that measures to address site blocking can reasonably be included in the Digital Economy bill and we will not support any such measures. "

Earlier in the Digital Economy bill's passage through the House of Lords, Liberal Democrat peers Lords Clement-Jones and Razzall proposed an amendment to block web sites allowing copyright infringement.

Although they later tried to retract the amendment, they were ruled out of order by Lord Anthony Young, parliamentary under secretary of state at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and the amendment remained.

The bill is set to have its second reading in the House of Commons on 6 April, after which it has four further hurdles to jump before royal assent is given.

These hurdles comprise the committee stage, report stage and third reading in the House of Commons, before consideration of any amendments by both the Lords and Commons.