London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Bill

I thank the Minister for his reply. I am extremely grateful that we have to debate only UK law here, rather than ranging more broadly. I welcome his disclaimer of other jurisdictions. I listened to the Minister with considerable interest. I will not go into detail about anything other than Amendment No. 71. I will consider the Minister’s arguments because these are drafting issues about whether a provision would broaden or restrict a particular usage. I am not sure that I accept his point about the exclusion of the words ““London Olympics””. It is possible under paragraph 3 to infringe the London association right; you do not get the appropriate defence under paragraph 8 unless the words ““London Olympics”” are deleted. You may have used those words but you may not have been referring to the London Olympics. There is a perfectly sound legal reason for that; we probably all have the same intentions. The key amendment deals with the issue of ““incidental””. The Government do not normally publish the legal advice they receive and I do not know to which splendidly optimistic QC the department has gone to talk about Premier League v Panini,but our interpretation and that of most commentators is that it presents considerable difficulties. The element of commerciality is looked at in seeing whether it is incidental. If the work in which something has been included is intended to serve a commercial purpose and its inclusion furthers that purpose, it is unlikely to be deemed incidental. As the Minister and Members of the Committee well know, newspapers are not charities, nor are broadcasters. By and large, things are done for commercial reasons. There is competition between newspapers and between broadcasters. How can you separate out editorial purposes from commercial purposes on every occasion? That puts LOGOC into a difficult position, almost the position of a judge, as to whether or not the Panini judgment should take effect. That is dangerous; it is the kind of problem that the newspaper and broadcasting industries see coming down the track. I urge the Minister to revisit this. I look forward to his letter elucidating the department’s interpretation of that case. It is very close to home for the DCMS, involving, as it does, a very important sporting body. None of this is done frivolously. None of us wants to trespass on editorial freedoms. The Minister was very cogent in that respect and I accept his assurances. However, I urge him to have another look at the provisions in paragraph 8 to make absolutely sure that we are not infringing those freedoms and storing up difficulties for our newspapers and broadcasters. On that basis, although we may well come back to this at Report, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. [Amendments Nos. 72 to 74 not moved.]