With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

New clause 3—Technical advisory committee—

‘(1)There shall be a Technical Advisory Committee consisting of such number of persons appointed by the Secretary of State as he may by order provide.

(2)The order providing for membership of the Technical Advisory Committee must make provision calculated to ensure that the Technical Advisory Committee has sufficient powers to enable it to oversee the operation of the deposit of publications as provided under this Act.

(3)The order providing for membership of the Technical Advisory Committee must also make provision calculated to ensure—

(a)that the membership of the Technical Advisory Committee includes persons likely effectively to represent the interests of publishers and deposit libraries;

(b)that the membership of the Technical Advisory Committee includes persons with the appropriate breadth of technical and business skills and experience;

(c)that such other person(s) if any as the Secretary of State thinks fit may be appointed as members of the Committee;

(d)that the Committee has an independent chairperson;

(e)that the Committee is constituted as to produce a balance between the representation of the interests of publishers and deposit libraries;

(4)Where the Secretary of State proposes to make any Regulations under this Act, or if the Technical Advisory Committee considers it timely and appropriate for the Secretary of State to make any Regulations under this Act,

(a)he shall consult the Technical Advisory Committee about the consequences of the making of any such Regulations for the deposit libraries and for the publishers that may be affected by those Regulations;

(b)the Technical Advisory Committee shall consult with the deposit libraries and with the publishers likely to be affected by those Regulations;

(c)he shall commission the carrying out of a Regulatory Impact Assessment following the consultation as mentioned in Subsection (4)(b) above, to assess the costs of compliance, technical feasibility and the impact of any Regulations on publishers’ legal and contractual obligations;

(d)the Technical Advisory Committee shall, inter alia, consider—

(i)the technical requirements and the financial consequences, if any, for the deposit libraries and for the publishers likely to be affected, of those Regulations;

(ii)whether the way in which those Regulations make provision as to the circumstances in which works published on line are treated as published in the United Kingdom is such as to exclude works that are accessible from, but not also published in, the United Kingdom and to exclude works that are not made available to the public;

(iii)whether the requirements under those Regulations are proportionate to what is sought to be achieved by them in respect of the preservation of the national intellectual archive;

(iv)whether the requirements under those Regulations are practicable and not excessive for the publisher required to comply with them and whether they impose a method of deposit that causes the least burden to the such publisher; and

(v)whether the making of any such Regulations, or any part of them, would conflict with the normal exploitation of any work, or category of work, to which this Act applies or would unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the owner(s) of the copyright or any rights of a similar nature in any such work.

(5)The Technical Advisory Committee shall report their conclusions on those matters to the persons mentioned in subsection (3)(a) and to the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of State, after considering any report of the Technical Advisory Committee, may either—

(i)withdraw the proposed Regulations; or

(ii)proceed with those Regulations subject to such modifications as the Secretary of State sees fit in order to take account of the conclusions of the Technical Advisory Committee as stated in any such Report.’.