P-to-P amendment delays French copyright bill

By Peter Sayer, IDG News Service
December 23, 2005 7:46 am ET

The French government has postponed the National Assembly’s vote on a new copyright law until the new year, abandoning its earlier insistence that the bill was so urgent that it must pass before year-end.

On Wednesday night, deputies from the majority and opposition parties voted two amendments to the “Authors’ rights and related rights in an information society” bill, authorizing the use of peer-to-peer file-sharing software to download copies of copyrighted music. The amendments go against the wishes of the government.

The government had previously declared the bill “urgent,” allowing it to skip the third and fourth readings in the National Assembly and Senate required by the usual procedure. Rather than rush the amended bill through, though, the government opted Thursday night to postpone the rest of the debate until the next parliamentary session, which begins on Jan. 17.

The bill is intended to transpose into national legislation a European Union directive on copyright. Such directives, proposed by the European Commission and voted on by the directly elected European Parliament, become binding on the national governments of the E.U. member states, which must implement them in national law by a deadline set in the directive. The French government had said fast-track treatment of the copyright bill was necessary because otherwise it would have to pay massive fines to the European Commission for missing the Dec. 22, 2002, deadline for implementation of the copyright directive.

In his blog, Deputy Christian Vanneste described the three days of debate leading up to the postponement as a “real battle.” He expressed surprise at depth of feeling in public reaction against the bill. Vanneste wrote a report for the National Assembly in May, explaining and justifying the government’s position.

Who, exactly, is this government? The majority party supports it. Parliment supports it. Yet the 'government' opposes it.

This is just my lack of knowledge of the french political system.

goldenpi,
in the multipartisan political system of most of the European Countries (including France), where also (independently from the number of parties) the national government is being created by the national parliament. It becomes a separate entity ruled by the Prime Minister (in Polish he's named Premier), not by the Parliament or the Head of State (the President in the case of France, the monarch (king or queen) in some other states, as Sweden (king)). It's the common case in Europe when this governing body loses the support of Parliament (even of its own party), which becames a de-facto opposition, in one specefic case or all the time. It also happens in Poland at some times.

In Liberty,
Critto
liberter.webpark.pl

sorry for my style, I was to say "it often happens in the multipartisan system ...."

And I thought politics here could be complicated...

Guess this'll be the end of the Fifth Republic (I think I read a prediction about that somewhere, hmmmm).

While many countries have made it illegal to distribute copyrighted material over the Internet, the French Parliament has actually voted to allow the free sharing of music and movies online, which was approved by 30 to 28. If their amendment succeeds in surviving, France would become the first country to legalise peer-to-peer file sharing.

Strictly speaking, peer-to-peer file sharing technology per se is not (or should not be) considered illegal anywhere.