Hon Christopher Finlayson

Clauses 1, 2, and 2A  

CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (National) : I can be relatively brief on these clauses. This is very important legislation, and I think that Mr Gallagher is right when he says it will become more important in the years to come. The first copyright Act, as I said, was that of the Statute of Anne in 1712, and of course the last substantive amendment to New Zealand law was the 1994 legislation, which basically followed, insofar as copyright was concerned, the 1988 Act from the United Kingdom.

But there is the very real question, when we come to have a good look at the legislation, as to whether the United Kingdom model should continue to be the model we adopt, particularly given the fact that so much of the copyright law of that country now includes material that has come from the European Union, or whether we should look further afield to United States models, the Singaporean model, or the Australian model. Those are very important questions.

As I said, copyright law was initially designed to protect literary works, but now we have to deal with the Internet age—the digital age, Internet applications, and so on. So copyright law is very important legislation. It is legislation that I think needs to be systematically and comprehensively reviewed on a regular basis. I know we cannot do that for every piece of legislation, because otherwise a tight and tough legislative timetable would become even worse than it is now. But it was with that in mind that the subcommittee that dealt with the Evidence Bill in 2006 urged the Government to incorporate the provision that is now in section 202 of the Evidence Act 2006, which provides for a mandatory periodic review of the operation of the Act, I think every 5 years. That is a very good way of looking at some legislation. The legislation we are dealing with here is too important to allow it to go off the boil, because then one is required, by way of amendment, to insert into a bill concepts that may sometimes be completely different from those already in the legislation, and the process of amendment can undermine the structure of the legislation.

So I am heartened that the Minister has said—and indeed the report of the Commerce Committee on the bill states—that the Ministry of Economic Development will be reviewing this legislation in 5 years’ time to ensure that copyright law is keeping pace with technological advances. Of course, the Minister has foreshadowed another copyright amendment bill in the next period to deal with the commissioning rule. I imagine it will also deal with issues related to artists’ royalties, and so on.

We have come a long way, even in 20 years. I can recall that the first copyright case I did was in the late 1980s. It was based on the 1962 Act. It was an interesting case, all about whether a fellow called Hughie Green had the copyright in the format of a talent quest programme called Opportunity Knocks. When the Privy Council biffed out his appeal, I recall that the Daily Mail, I think it was, said “Opportunity flops—or flip-flops”. The reality of the matter is that the 1962 Act was designed for a set of events or a set of issues that we really are a world away from.

Hon Mark Burton: Didn’t Hughie Green’s programme actually start in the 1960s?

CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: I think that it did; indeed, it did. The issue was whether Television New Zealand had breached copyright by taking the format of the programme. There would be an introduction, like “Mark Burton, opportunity knocks”, and then there would be an interesting thing called the clapometer, and so on. It was all very interesting, but it is a million miles away from the copyright issues we are dealing with today.

However, I tell the Committee that Mr Green did say to me that format protection would be a huge issue. He said that we should look 20 years hence, when most of what was on television would in some way be a format programme, and I think he was quite right about that. I know attempts have been made in the United Kingdom to deal with the issue of format protection.

There we have it. Copyright is a hugely important issue, and it is one that is too important for it to become the subject of party politics. Certainly, notwithstanding the fact that we received the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper fairly late in the day, we have tried to engage in the debate in a sensible and principled way, because this issue is too important to engage in party politics on. If members of the commercial community had concerns as a result of the hearings in the Commerce Committee, then they needed to be dealt with, and that is why the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper has been taken on board by the Opposition. Thank you.