Digital Economy Bill

Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Thursday 2nd February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, this group of amendments includes Amendment 233A, which is in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Clement-Jones. When I read the initial amendments proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, I felt supportive towards them. They relate particularly to children, but, as she has said, there is also an issue with regard to adults.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, said, not only Members of Parliament have suffered and spoken about this—and I am glad that they have done so—but people with disabilities or learning difficulties. Social media sites are often used as a tool by stalkers, and, as the noble Baroness said, such behaviour has led to people suffering mental illness and, at times, to murder. I very much support the amendments in her name. The difference between them and my amendment is that mine would introduce a criminal test under the guidance of the CPS. I think we all agree that we must have some form of enforcement of the action that should be taken against this form of behaviour.

It seems to me that the providers have to take some responsibility. It was put to me that, if people were damaging themselves fighting and stabbing each other in a pub, the landlord would have some responsibility for that. The internet service providers also have some responsibility in this matter.

I realise that this is a difficult area to legislate for, and I know that there are other forms of legislation. Here we are looking for a way to work with interested parties, such as the NSPCC. We have made progress on action for children, but we are woefully behind in taking action against this damaging behaviour against adults.

I very much support the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and I hope that the Minister might support some of the sentiment, and the letter, of my Amendment 233A.

[Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve (CB)]

My Lords, I had not intended to speak on this point, but this may be relevant evidence. Last year, I went to a meeting with a parliamentary group that was looking at hate speech issues, and a representative of Facebook was there. She said—one may say that this did not show quite a correct view of freedom of expression—that Facebook takes down whatever its customers find offensive. A member of the public said, “Actually, when you have had 20 independent complaints, you take it down and it is immediately put up again”. That second step is where the remedies are not working at present. It does not get taken down. This was mainly about anti-Semitic hate speech of a vile sort that would have been well known in certain quarters in the 1930s. This is an urgent matter, which we need some remedy for.

[The Earl of Erroll]

My Lords, it has been suggested to me that this group of amendments could also be used in the code of practice and the safety responsibilities could also be drawn up to include non-age-verified pornography.

Digital Economy Bill

Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve Excerpts

Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 6th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (Viscount Ullswater) (Con)]

I must advise your Lordships that, if this amendment is agreed to, I will not be able to call Amendments 200 to 202 because of pre-emption.

[Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve (CB)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support this amendment. There seems to be something quite perverse in obstructing the access of the Statistics Board to datasets that are in the hands of other public bodies. That is a very simplified account, but it is a curious place in which to have an obstacle. I hope that the Minister can consider this clause very seriously.

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I am obliged to the noble Baronesses for their interest in this part of the Bill. As your Lordships will be aware, Clause 68 gives the UK Statistics Authority the powers to access important data needed to produce official statistics to support decision-making.

On Amendment 199, new Section 45B gives UKSA a right of access to information held by Crown bodies. A Crown body must respond in writing to a formal notice issued by the UK Statistics Authority and explain any refusal to give the authority information. If the Crown body’s explanation is inadequate or it fails to respond or comply, the UK Statistics Authority may lay the request and any response before the relevant legislature. A Crown body must therefore either comply with the notice or explain its refusal in writing. Where the Statistics Authority puts that correspondence before Parliament, then Parliament can judge the body’s actions openly and transparently. We consider that this is the right approach, creating effective, proportionate accountability and transparency.

Of course, my noble friend Lady Byford would argue that the amendment is a more effective means of requiring a Crown body to give the Statistics Authority the information. We cannot accept that it is either necessary or desirable. The Statistics Authority is part of the Crown, as are government departments. As my noble friend anticipated, it would be extremely novel, and possibly unprecedented, to legislate to compel one part of the Crown to obey another. Even the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 excludes the Crown from being subject to enforcement measures such as prosecution, instead providing long-standing structures to help departments to work with each other administratively. In this context, new Section 45B strikes the right balance. I hope that explanation reassures my noble friend.

Digital Economy Bill

Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 8th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones]

My Lords, I know that the noble Earl himself is perfect in almost every way, so I would very much hesitate to argue with him. Still, I feel we need something rather broader than this proposal would provide.

[Baroness O’Neill of Bengarve (CB)]

My Lords, I share the view that the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, has expressed, that the amendment probably is not the way to go about this. Algorithms are too ubiquitous, useful and powerful in this case. I do not know what we could do instead, but I note that one of the things we are looking at, together with the problem that the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, has identified, is that the internet service providers and the big media companies are supposedly platforms, not publishers, and they do not have the responsibilities of publishers for that reason. Facebook will say that it merely hosts the material that individuals post. When individuals post material, they ought to think that it reaches an indefinite number of people because the algorithm spreads it through the echo chambers. It is the cyber silos that we are going to have to think about. With the greatest regret, I do not think the amendment would do that, but I very much support the principle of looking into this matter.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been a very interesting debate. We, particularly those of us of a certain age, often get to a point where we are scared of the technology that we are expected to use. We are in the hands of our children, who shout things like, “It’s intuitive! Just do it!”, but we do not have the faintest idea what we are trying to do. However, we should not be scared of technologies. History should tell us that the reason why Shakespeare’s Globe is outside the city walls of London is that people like us in those days felt that they were dangerous plays that should not be seen by too many people. Video nasties and indeed concerns about some of the issues that are in the Bill are examples of the same thing. We have to be careful that this is not just another “penny dreadful” story but a serious issue.

I was not that concerned about this matter in my own consciousness until I came across it personally and in relation to something that has already been mentioned in the debate. I work with a small charity that relies entirely on a website presence in order to try to help people who suffer from the condition that it serves. For the first seven or eight years of the charity’s life, we were ranked number one on a search engine—let us call it Google—so when you searched for the condition, we came up top. In the last six months, we have gone from top to, I think, 44th in the rankings for this condition, which means that no one now uses our services, rings up or communicates with us. We are now on page four of the search results and that turns out to have been achieved by a change in the algorithm, which prunes out the people who apply. The ISP put in a particular search term that managed to knock down the efficacy of the inquiries that were coming to us at our charity. So the charity, which was doing good work and reaching 2,000 or 3,000 people a year, is now reaching no one, and we cannot change that because the algorithm is behind a commercial confidential situation. So I pick up the points that are being made all round the Chamber about the need for us to get more clued up about this without being scared of it, and I support the amendment for that reason.

The second point that has been picked up, which slightly goes against the wise words of the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, is that, where an algorithm is helping to achieve a relatively straightforward systems approach, it is probably not as much of an issue as where it is substituting its judgment for yours. It is not knowing what that judgment is that is the problem, and that is where the points that have been made need to be picked up. That is something that we would all benefit from. Whether or not this is the right amendment, there is an issue here that will need to be pursued, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

Digital Economy Bill

Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Wednesday 8th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury]

My Lords, my name is also attached to these amendments, and I support the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam. They add the necessary extra scrutiny needed for media mergers and ensure that Ofcom’s fit and proper test is effectively applied.

These amendments specify further grounds for the Secretary of State to refer media mergers to Ofcom. As the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, mentioned, the existing plurality safeguards are no longer adequate. They do not deal with market dominance and they are not sufficient for protecting editorial independence of media outlets. It is vital for the media environment that no company possesses disproportionate power to influence public opinion or the political and policy-making process. Plurality safeguards are an essential part of protecting the public and decision-makers from media organisations which are allowed to expand without proper scrutiny.

Then there is the matter of Ofcom’s fit and proper test. As many noble Lords will know, Ofcom must supply a test of fitness and propriety to owners of broadcast licences. At the moment, this test is not spelled out. What we propose would add definition to the test, using the recommendations of Leveson 2. Taking the current Sky-Fox bid as an example, I believe that this would ensure that the present chief executive of 21st Century Fox, James Murdoch, would undergo proper scrutiny if he were to retain a senior position at Sky.

I echo the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, in one of the letters to which he referred. How we deal with the concentration of power decides the kind of country we are. I, too, understood that that is what Theresa May said when she became Prime Minister. Now it is for her Government to follow the logic, evidence and facts, and accept these amendments. They do not bind the Government; they simply strengthen the merger and plurality regime already in place. They put appropriate and proportionate power in the hands of an independent regulator, Ofcom, in order to protect the interests of citizens and consumers.

To quote my friend, Sir Vince Cable:

“The public interest centres on plurality and fitness”.


These are beneficial proposals which have been carefully agreed through cross-party consideration. I hope that the Minister will recognise this and respond positively.

[Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve (CB)]

My Lords, I support this amendment. I remember well—and the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam has reminded us of it—that, in 2003, we had quite dramatic discussions in your Lordships’ House about the dual duties of Ofcom to the citizen and to the consumer. There was a bit of a wobble after Ofcom was set up, but since then it has properly seen itself as defending these two separate interests and not, as was initially suggested, merging them into the interests of a fictitious character called the citizen-consumer. That was an unfortunate, but brief, episode.

I believe the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, hit the nail on the head when he said that this pair of amendments is highly congruent with the Government’s policy. Not merely has the Prime Minister spoken about acting in the interests of “you rather than the few”, she has also started to refer to “issues of corporate governance”. This is basically what this is about—the standards that we think are relevant in corporate governance.

This has been a very unhappy decade in which there have been failures of corporate governance in many sectors. I am a member of the Banking Standards Board, looking at the culture of the banks. I read every day about this culture and realise how vital is the requirement that only those who have passed fit and proper person tests come into positions of leadership and influence in the banking sector. I realise how important this also is for the media sector—indeed, it is perhaps more important.

As we have seen clearly in the last few weeks, with the presidential campaign in the United States, the media have changed hugely in this decade. We can get spiralling misinformation that is extremely difficult to stem once it gets a hold in social media; once it spreads with the rapidity which the greediest of proprietors could never have imagined. In this world, more than ever, serious corporate governance has to take account of the ethics, as well as the law, of the fitness and propriety of leadership, as well as the adequacy of regulation. I support the proposal that Ofcom get a clear grip on the fitness and propriety of those who lead the broadcasting industries.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been a very important debate on a very big issue. Its sharpness has been reinforced by the fact that we are currently in a process involving all the issues that have been referred to. Obviously, this will be reflected in the fact that the response will not be made by a Minister in the department which might have to deal with some of the results of the current proposals for a merger, and we respect that and understand the reasons for that.

The wonderful speech by my noble friend Lord Puttnam, which took us back to the origins of the Ofcom regime that we now have and reflected on points along the way, including the dark shadows cast by the events of 2011, gave a texture to this that makes it much more important. The noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, spoke about the need to think about how all this interfaces into descriptions of the sort of country we want to live in and the sort of society that we can enjoy. The necessary handles on both policy and the implementation of that policy are very important.

At heart, the amendments are simple. They draw out in more detail and focus on issues which have been live ever since they were first introduced. Indeed, I recall discussions in your Lordships’ House on two Bills which dealt with issues that bore on this and for which we had debates of this type. That does not mean to say that this is ground that no longer needs to be tilled. It does, because in thinking about this we have to recognise some of the issues that have already surfaced in Committee today and throughout the Bill—that when we are talking about the media, particularly but not restricted to the digital media, we have to think very carefully about the pace of change and the adjustments that have to be made to the policy framework in order to achieve what will be proportionate and appropriate regulatory functions later on down the line.

The good thing about the amendments is that they make us think about the words that were used, which seemed appropriate at the time, in relation to the twin requirements: that we look at plurality in relation to media but also at control. If this were a simple case of looking at how a monopoly might influence outcomes and how consumers are treated, it would not be necessary, perhaps, to delve so deeply. The issues that are currently addressed by the CMA, for instance, are largely economic. They deal with prices. They deal with the way in which consumers are treated, but they are basically around whether or not the price has been artificially moved in order to favour the producer against the citizen. In that sense, we do not need to think too hard about some of the issues, although we can regret them, as we did in the debate in the dinner hour, which I was able to participate in, which focused almost exclusively on why consumers have disappeared from government, consumer interests are rarely referred to and there are not even consumer panels on the CMA. But that debate can be read in Hansard, and I am sure it will be of much interest to those who are interested in this point.

The amendments would go back over the grounds on which a PIIN is issued and make it clearer than it is currently that simple questions of plurality, which are readily gamed in terms of corporate structures these days—this issue was perhaps not so resonant at the time that the legislation was drafted—need to have a little bit more bite if they are to look at some of the detail that we want in this area. We have to look not just at the question of ownership and control in relation to a market-facing issue but at the way in which such an agglomeration can distort and change that market, which is not in the public interest. It is very important that we do that. There may well be a way of dealing with this under the existing legislation, but it would be so much easier if the amendment was accepted because it would take us down a line that was more focused on the particularity of the media arrangements.

Then there is the question of the fit and proper person test for those who have broadcast licences. The basic structure is there. Again, on reflection, it could be argued—and I think it has been demonstrated today—that without more concern about the issues which arise out of the merger, without more concern about how the operation will work in terms of who activates it, what exactly the issues are that will be looked at, what the proprieties are that we are concerned about, and where the ethical concerns are and all that, then it will not be as effective. I look forward to hearing from the Minister.

--- Later in debate ---

I hope, therefore, that the Minister can give us at least some indication that the department is looking at Irish press accountability, and will give us a judgment as to which approach they prefer and the recommendations they intend to make.

[Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve]

My Lords, it is late, and I do not want to repeat myself. I am sure that the noble Baroness, the noble Lord and the whole of that long Front Bench—almost as numerous as the rest of the House at this hour—know this issue not going to go away. This retrospective consultation does not do the Government honour. I hope that they will take some action.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, again, given the lateness of the hour, I simply say that our views are well known, that we have supported the implementation of Section 40 in a number of previous debates in this Chamber, and on that basis we support the amendment.