The Liberal Democrat party has instructed its leadership and its new government Ministers to repeal the coyright enforcement measures in the  Digital Economy Act.

The instruction took the form of an amendment to the main  motion at the Liberal Democrat special conference in Birmingham over the week-end. The purpose of the motion, entitled Building a Fairer Britain,   was to confirm the membership support for the coalition agreement between the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives, and also to clarify actions, positions and legislation which the membership would approve. The amendment concerning the DE Act reads:

Conference urges Liberal Democrat ministers and MPs to take all possible steps to ensure the repeal of those sections of the Digital Economy Act 2010 which are inconsistent with policy motion Freedom, Creativity and the Internet as passed at Spring Conference 2010.

The policy motion on Freedom, Creativity and Internet opposed the copyright enforcement /3-strikes measures in the Digital Economy  Act, and the provision to permit courts to order the blocking of websites for copyright enforcement purposes.

Thus, the instruction to Liberal Democrat leader and Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, and to the new Business Secretary, Vince Cable, is clear - repeal those sections of the Digital Economy Act which address copyright enforcement and website blocking. 

The full text of the Liberal Democrat motion on Building a Fairer Britain  is here . 

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial-Share Alike 2.5 UK:England and Wales License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/ It may be used for non-commercial purposes only, and the author's name should be attributed. The correct attribution for this article is: Monica Horten (2010)  Repeal the DE Act: Liberal Democrats instruct Clegg  http://www.iptegrity.com 17 May 2010