Part of Cultural Property (Armed Conflicts) Bill [Lords] – in a Public Bill Committee at 9:45 am on 15 November 2016.
Kevin Brennan
Shadow Minister (Culture, Media and Sport) (Arts and Heritage)
9:45,
15 November 2016
I thank the Minister for her response and for giving the Opposition access to her officials before Second Reading. For a Bill of this kind, it is very helpful to be able to have such discussions and to clarify things in advance.
In a sense, the Minister did not address my point about the potential conflict between Baroness Neville-Rolfe’s remarks in the House of Lords that clarifying the Bill by amending it to include the words “in digital form” would damage the international interpretation of what is meant by cultural property and that the wording of the convention effectively includes digital cultural property. I am not going to press that point, because the Minister and the Government have made it clear that they believe that the definition should be flexible enough to include digital property. It is useful for her to put that on the record and repeat it to the Committee today.
Later in the Bill we will get on to the very interesting subject—hon. Members from both sides of the Committee might want to contemplate this—of which cultural objects and what cultural property in this country, and indeed in each of our constituencies, are regarded as being of sufficient importance to all the people of the world, not just to us and our constituents, to be worthy of protection under the convention. I am sure everybody will spring to life later to give examples from their constituencies, because every hon. Member has in their Constituency a cultural treasure that is important to all the people of the world. I look forward to hearing about the cultural richness of this country, including Queen’s Park and north London—your part of the world, Ms Buck, although you are not allowed to talk about it. I accept the Minister’s assurances on Amendment 6. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
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