ACTA review scrapped - vote coming, Irish gov supports

KyussBishop

What has happened:
The EU was going to refer ACTA to the European Court of Justice, which could have delayed adoption of ACTA for up to two years, but instead it is carrying on with negotiating it in the EU now:
https://torrentfreak.com/acta-battle-nears-climax-in-europe-120328/

This could result in a vote on ACTA in June (as originally planned), which is not altogether a bad thing because the ECJ delay could have allowed it to slip under the radar 2 years later.


Description of ACTA:
ACTA is an international copyright treaty, to be signed by the EU, which was written undemocratically and in complete secret by governments and lobby groups.
It obligates every country that signs it (including Ireland), to implement new copyright laws based upon the treaty, but the treaty has very dangerously broad/generalized definitions of these laws.

The definition of laws in ACTA could be used as a basis to cut people off from the internet on accusation alone of copyright infringement, to create a system of blocking websites accused of copyright infringement but with no due process in court, and in general to slowly build a system of increasing censorship on the internet.

Even the EU's Rapporteur for ACTA has resigned in protest against this treaty, denouncing it and saying there was:
"no inclusion of civil society organizations, a lack of transparency from the start of the negotiations, repeated postponing of the signature of the text without an explanation being ever given, [and] exclusion of the EU Parliament's demands that were expressed on several occasions in [the] assembly"


What to do about it:
EDIT: Correction, contacting local TD's/politicians isn't useful, the Irish MEP's (Members of the European Parliament) need to be contacted instead:
www.europarl.ie/view/en/Your_MEPs.html

This needs discussion now because it is probably going to vote in June, and from past emails I've had, Ireland definitely supports it.

Like the recent website injunction law, people need to contact Irish MEP's, find what their point of view is on ACTA and get them to oppose it.
The difficult thing about this, is that ACTA is so broad and ill-defined, it is hard to explain specific issues with it; it also pays lip-service in the text to fundamental rights etc. (despite providing no actual safeguards), which allows a quick way for politicians to dismiss your concerns.

One of the most fundamental points of contention though, is that it was negotiated completely in secret, with no democratic oversight or inclusion of the public in decision making, and the ACTA Committee can push for introduction of new undemocratic laws at any time as a part of the ACTA agreement.

It is basically an abuse of the process of writing up laws, using international treaties, so that the people and most of government in a country have no say, and then the treaty is signed and they are obligated to introduce laws matching the treaty. It is a completely inappropriate abuse of international treaties, that basically amounts to 'policy laundering'.



Other detailed aspects of ACTA:
The treaty sets up an international 'ACTA Comittee', which is not a part of existing international diplomatic institutions, and which will direct the future implementation of ACTA, possibly without any oversight or democracy. Basically, future copyright laws everywhere, could be written up and decided by this undemocratic organization, without any input from the people of a country, and without any oversight.

Other specific points of contention in the treaty, are that ACTA allows excessively broad charges for copyright infringement, e.g. possibly fines in tens of thousands for a single song;
it also potentially criminalizes generic drugs (a previously patented drug that is no longer patented), making many drugs more expensive and harming the public health of developing countries, as countries under ACTA could be prevented from shipping them to developing countries.


List of Irish MEP's and contact info:

• Emer Costello
  Email: emer.costello@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Gay Mitchell
  Phone: 01 4961940
  Email: gay.mitchell@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Paul Murphy
  Phone: 01 679 5030
  Email: paul.murphy@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Liam Aylward
  Phone: 056 776 8703
  Email: liam.aylward@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Nessa Childers
  Phone: 01 296 2263
  Email: nessa.childers@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Mairead McGuinness
  Phone: 041 685 4633
  Email: mairead.mcguinness@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Brian Crowley
  Phone: 021 489 6433
  Email: brian.crowley@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Seán Kelly
  Phone: 061 468788
  Email: seankellymep@gmail.com
  
• Phil Prendergast
  Phone: 052 612 4380
  Email: phil.prendergast@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Pat the Cope Gallagher
  Phone: 074 9521276
  Email: patthecope.gallagher@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Marian Harkin
  Phone: 071 914 5890
  Email: marian.harkin@europarl.europa.eu
  
• Jim Higgins
  Phone: 094 936 7323
  Email: jim.higgins@europarl.europa.eu

Scofflaw

Sorry - just to be clear, this is an EU Parliament vote, not a Council vote, so the position of the Irish government is theoretically irrelevant, but may affect the position of Irish government-party MEPs:

The European Parliament’s international trade committee has rejected a proposal by David Martin, an MEP who is drafting the Parliament’s position on ACTA. Martin wanted to ask the European Court of Justice for its opinion on the controversial anti-piracy treaty, but the committee decided yesterday that wasn’t needed and will now vote in June on whether to approve ACTA. Opponents of the treaty see the development as a victory.

It's worth lobbying MEPs directly rather than the government, because they're the ones making the decision:

“If ACTA dies in European Parliament, then it’s a permakill, and the monopoly lobbies will have to start fighting uphill,” said Pirate Party founder Rick Falkvinge in a comment. “If ACTA passes, the same monopolists get tons of new powers to use, and close the door for the foreseeable future behind the legislators for a very necessary reform of the copyright and patent monopolies.”

cordially,
Scofflaw

RichieC

Why is our government acting against the interest of it's people and in favour or faceless foreign corporations? /he asked naively...

kippy

RichieC wrote: »

Why is our government acting against the interest of it's people and in favour or faceless foreign corporations? /he asked naively...

I'm not in favour of a lot of these copyright laws in the way they are probably going to use but you do have to see the point of view of a technically inept government.

There are many many people in this country who are directly or indirectly employed in the many areas of industry that these copyright laws are trying to protect.

RichieC

kippy wrote: »

I'm not in favour of a lot of these copyright laws in the way they are probably going to use but you do have to see the point of view of a technically inept government.

There are many many people in this country who are directly or indirectly employed in the many areas of industry that these copyright laws are trying to protect.

So prior to this we had no actionable laws in Ireland regarding copyrights?

And what about the the other sector that employs people? internet businesses and IT?

kippy

RichieC wrote: »

So prior to this we had no actionable laws in Ireland regarding copyrights?

And what about the the other sector that employs people? internet businesses and IT?

As I said, I amn't in favour of these laws at all, just pointing out that there are Irish people, involved in film, music, photography, broadcasting, that will most likely benefit, directly or indirectly from these laws. Laws, which appear to be far more outreaching than anything currently in place and which appear to be applied on a far higher scale (European)
I'd like to know how these laws will in adversely effect those in "IT", such as myself for example?

RichieC

kippy wrote: »

As I said, I amn't in favour of these laws at all, just pointing out that there are Irish people, involved in film, music, photography, broadcasting, that will most likely benefit, directly or indirectly from these laws. Laws, which appear to be far more outreaching than anything currently in place and which appear to be applied on a far higher scale (European)
I'd like to know how these laws will in adversely effect those in "IT", such as myself for example?

sudden flight from the countries new draconian laws by companies like Google, for instance? I'm not saying it will but it could have a knock on effect. It just won't be worth doing business when when there's other countries willing to raise the mighty middle finger to these charlatans.

KyussBishop

Scofflaw wrote: »

Sorry - just to be clear, this is an EU Parliament vote, not a Council vote, so the position of the Irish government is theoretically irrelevant, but may affect the position of Irish government-party MEPs:



It's worth lobbying MEPs directly rather than the government, because they're the ones making the decision:



cordially,
Scofflaw

Good point, I missed that; don't have a very good understanding of the political process in EU parliament.

EDIT: Okey, updated original post and included list of MEP's plus contact info.