Advice on legislation or legal policy issues contained in this paper is provided for use in parliamentary debate and for related parliamentary purposes. This paper is not professional legal opinion.
Briefing Paper No. 13/2000 by Gareth Griffith
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The purpose of this paper is to comment upon the relationship between MPs and
copyright law and to analyse the impact of the law of parliamentary privilege
upon it. That relationship can be approached from at least three perspectives
which can be categorised as the 'governmental', 'parliamentary' and
'private'.
- Under the 'governmental' category, when in government and acting in a
ministerial capacity, an MP can claim the immunities granted to the Crown under
the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth) (pages 2-3).
- Under the 'parliamentary' category, an MP will also be able to claim the
immunities which flow from parliamentary privilege, but only in relation to
those activities which come under the umbrella of 'proceedings in parliament'
(pages 3-8).
- Under the 'private' category, an MP can be taken to be a private individual
and therefore subject to the normal application of the copyright law (pages
11-12).
- A potential fourth category is also discussed. This refers to the
exemptions under the Copyright Act 1968 for copying by parliamentary
libraries for MPs (pages 8-11).
