John Halligan (Waterford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am coming to that.

At that time the UK introduced a private copying exception without imposing levies. The UK provision was successfully judicially reviewed in 2015, with the court stating that, without sufficient evidence showing the lack of harm caused to right holders, a private copying exception would require a compensation scheme to be established. That is a very reasonable answer to some of the questions the Senators have asked.

There is also a wealth of EU law, particularly under the 2001 information society directive and EU case law, including the Padawan and Reprobel cases, which impacted on that decision. Given that the exception proposed by the Copyright Review Committee for implementation in Ireland was similar to the failed UK exception, and our expectation that it would almost certainly be legally challenged and struck down, it was decided not to progress the committee's recommendation in this area.It was decided not to progress the committee's recommendation in this particular area. This view was taken in conjunction with the legal advice the Department received on the issue. As already mentioned, that was included in the memorandum to Government seeking approval for the draft Bill.

To go back to the Padawan case to which the Senator referred, the EU found that private copying levies cannot be imposed on commercial users. Most commercial users are either copying their own material or copying copyright material under the terms of licence paid to collecting societies and creators. The little evidence that is available shows that many manufacturers pass on levies on consumer goods such as mobile phones and iPads, which can be significant and which are payable directly by consumers.

The Department has been given legal direction on this. We also spoke to the Controller of Patents, Designs and Trade Marks and the copyright review committee in 2013. We see the levies as a tax on consumers. The proposed amendment refers to a "blank recording medium" which is too vague in the context of the advances that have been made in media storage in recent years.

The Bill is very complicated but I have done my best to deal with amendment No. 6 and to address the issue of the levies and the copyright exception. As I have said, the UK's copyright law was amended in 2014 to introduce a private copying exception without a levy. While I thank Senators for their contributions, based on the detailed information collected by the Department, I cannot accept the amendments.