The Government’s data reforms have moved ever closer to becoming law with the third reading of the Data (Use & Access) Bill this week, but ministers have failed to appease the creative industries over claims that tech companies will be allowed to ride roughshod over UK copyright laws to build AI systems.
The fight against a change in the law has been taken up by cross-bench peer and campaigner Baroness Beeban Kidron, who successfully tabled an amendment in the Lords to protect creatives from having their copyrighted work used to train AI models without permission or remuneration.
However, these changes were removed by the Government during the committee stage of the legislation in the Commons. This week, Liberal Democrat MP Victoria Collins reintroduced it to the Commons, but it was voted against by 287 to 88.
Speaking in the Commons, technology minister Sir Chris Bryant said the creative industries should be “remunerated for the work that they have produced” and copyright law will remain “robust and clear”.
But he argued the amendments pre-empted the results of its separate copyright and AI consultation – which closed in February – and that the Government does not want to legislate in a “piecemeal” fashion. Instead, ministers have pledged to conduct an economic impact assessment of the policy options put forward in its consultation.
Even so, Labour MP for Scarborough and Whitby Alison Hume urged tech firms to “tell us what they are doing behind our backs, and pay up”.
Hume said she understood the Government “wants more time”, but added: “I worry that in the gap between this data Bill becoming law and a new Bill which addresses transparency in copyright, everything that can be scraped will be scraped.”
She added: “Necessity is the mother of invention, and without a legal instruction for AI companies to reveal what they are using free of charge, there’s surely no incentive for the AI industry to come up with the solutions to make it simple for original creators and collecting societies to assert their rights.”
The chief executive of the Publishers Association Dan Conway, whose members had mounted a protest outside Parliament, told The Bookseller: “The way forward for the Government remains clear. Legislate for transparency requirements now, consult on how to supercharge tech and creative industries’ partnerships through licensing, and simply move on from the polarising red-herring that is copyright reform.”
Both the Advertising Association, which set up its AI Taskforce in 2023, and the IPA have also expressed their concerns over how AI tools are being trained but have yet to comment on the latest move.
The Bill is now set to return to the Lords, with both chambers expected to debate the final wording before it gains Royal Assent.
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