MPs: Ministers must give protections to creative sector amid AI copyright fears

Ministers must heed warnings from the creative industries over the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on copyright and provide them with legal protections, according to MPs.

The Data (Use and Access) Bill was amended by peers in a bid to protect creatives from having their copyrighted work used to train AI models without permission or remuneration.

The measures would explicitly subject AI companies to UK copyright law, regardless of where they are based, reveal the names and owners of web crawlers that currently operate anonymously and allow copyright owners to know when, where and how their work is used.

MPs made clear their desire for the Government to act, either by retaining the amendments or bringing forward new legislation, when the Bill made its first appearance in the Commons on Wednesday.

A Government consultation on the issue is due to close on February 25, with ministers suggesting they may introduce an exemption to copyright law for “text and data mining”.

Culture minister Sir Chris Bryant said the Government will respond to the consultation “as soon as we can” and legislation is expected to implement “whatever we choose to do in the end” as they seek a “win-win” arrangement.

Labour MP Chris Kane (Stirling and Strathallan) said the amendments supported by the Lords on copyright and transparency “resonate greatly with me and much of the creative community” as he urged colleagues to “give them due consideration” at committee stage in the Commons.

Mr Kane, who previously worked in broadcasting, welcomed the Government’s consultation before adding: “The concerns of the creative industries must be heard and must be acted upon.

“Copyright protections are not a barrier to AI innovation and competition, but they are a safeguard for the work of an industry worth £125 billion per year, employing over two million people.

“We can enable a world where much of this value is transferred to a handful of big tech firms or we can enable a win-win situation for the creative industries and AI developers, one where they work together based on licensed relationships with remuneration and transparency at its heart.”

Alison Hume, Labour MP for Scarborough and Whitby, said she was a writer on the BBC show New Tricks and episodes of the show are “being used by generative AI to write scripts”.

She said: “Twice a year, I receive the royalties collected for me by the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society.

“I am paid fairly for my original work when it is rebroadcast around the world or on digital platforms.

“This week, I discovered that the subtitles from one of my episodes of New Tricks have been scraped and are being used to create learning materials for artificial intelligence.

“Along with thousands of other films and television shows, my original work is being used by generative AI to write scripts which one day may replace versions produced by mere humans like me.

“This is theft, and it’s happening on an industrial scale.

“As the law stands, artificial intelligence companies don’t have to be transparent about what they are stealing.”

SNP MP and musician Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) said the creative industries are key to the UK Government’s growth agenda, saying: “You do not mess with that and undermine it in the way that this Government might possibly be doing with the watering down of some of the copyright provisions and giving access to generative AI to our nation’s creative treasures.”

Mr Wishart urged the Government to “bring it on” if it has new legislation to protect the creative industries, noting the amendments to the Bill before the House must be supported until that point.

Labour MP James Frith (Bury North), a former member of the band Finka who once played at Glastonbury, thanked ministers for being in “listening mode” on copyright matters.

He said: “The Government’s commitment to an industrial strategy includes our brilliant creative industries, but discussions with this industry should focus on how we advance and enhance it; we risk, otherwise, making it about how we protect its very existence if we do not take seriously the deep alarm voiced by creators over the threat posed by AI.”

Closing the debate, Labour frontbencher Sir Chris said two working groups involving people from the creative industries and AI companies have been established to examine the issues of transparency and rights reservation.

Sir Chris said: “If there were to be a system of simple digital fingerprinting that could lead to people being able to say ‘No, you can’t use my work’ or ‘Yes you can use my work for large language model training once you’ve remunerated me’ and whether you could do that individually or whether an artist perhaps do it through Dacs (the Design and Artists Copyright Society) or if you’re a musician do it through your record label or whatever it may be … then that would be a great outcome for everybody because it would lead to a new system of remuneration.

“That’s why I’m so keen on not selling the pass on that possibility by having undermined it before we get there.”

Sir Chris added “we’re trying to get to a win-win and we don’t believe this is unachievable”, telling MPs: “In the end it’ll look like a full Bill, a standalone Bill, I’d have thought, whatever we choose to do in the end.”

The Data (Use and Access) Bill as a whole governs a range of data including on births, marriages and deaths, to healthcare, crime and driving licences.