People power wins the day as MEPs reject global deal in copyright theft

The European Parliament has rejected a global agreement against copyright theft, handing a victory to protesters who say the legislation would punish people for sharing films and music online.

The vote marked the culmination of a two-year battle between legislators who supported the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) and its largely young, digitally savvy opponents.

Tens of thousands of activists held rallies across Europe in February to protest against the law, which they said would curb their freedom and allow officials to spy on their online activities. About 2.5 million signed a petition against ACTA.

MEPs voted against the agreement by 478 to 39, meaning the proposed law will have to be renegotiated by the European Commission, the EU’s executive.

Scottish Labour MEP David Martin said before yesterday’s vote that the agreement was dead.

“No emergency surgery, no transplant, no long period of recuperation is going to save ACTA,” Mr Martin said. “It’s time to give it its last rites. It’s time to allow its friends to mourn and for the rest of us to get on with our lives.”

European Parliament president Martin Schulz said in a statement following the rejection that legislators were not against intellectual property rights, but that ACTA left too much room for abuses and raised “concern about its impact on consumers’ privacy and civil liberties, on innovation and the free flow of information”.

ACTA took four years to negotiate and has already been signed by several of the European Union’s big trading partners, including the United States, Canada and Japan. Its rejection is likely to complicate free-trade talks, officials say.

One of the aims of the agreement was to stem the growing tide of illegal downloads and streaming of illegal copies of films and music online. It also calls on signatories to seize fake goods and punish gangs making and selling them.

In rejecting ACTA, the European Parliament has not only raised doubts about the agreement’s future, but also called into question a separate proposed EU law on enforcing copyright.

EU officials fear they will encounter similar resistance when they attempt to reform the outdated law, IPRED, later this year.

The existing copyright law was adopted in 2001, when slow internet dial-up connections were not capable of the swift flow of file-sharing seen today.

“There are a lot of people who protested against ACTA who would be willing to protest against the EU’s IPRED,” Marietje Schaake, a Dutch member of the European Parliament said. “We don’t want reform of copyright to be stifled by a confrontational atmosphere between the public and the commission.”

The cost of web piracy to the European Union is difficult to estimate, because compiling such figures would require spying on people’s online habits. But record label lobbyists say a steady decline in revenues is enough evidence.

Business groups said the ACTA rejection meant the European Union would be weakened in free trade negotiations with the United States, Canada and emerging markets that are relative newcomers to intellectual property.