Britain should become a “global centre for the creative industries in the digital age” according to the final Digital Britain report, which outlines policy commitments to digital development as part of ‘Building Britain’s Future’, the Government’s industrial strategy. The principal issues for the creative sector are the intended support for developing content, intellectual property (IP) and the consequent problem of Internet piracy, and skills development. In his introduction to the report, Lord Carter, Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for both the Department for Business, Innovations and Skills (BIS, formerly the DIUS) and the DCMS, called the report “a statement of ambition for the future growth of our creative industries”. The main policies on piracy are to create a clearer legal framework to replace illegal downloading with a payment-based business model, to educate the public in what is lawful, and to enable IP rights holders to pursue transgressors. The report also acknowledges the cultural and artistic importance of the interactive and online worlds, saying that “they may in future have a cultural relevance to rival that of film”, and committing to tax relief proposals to support online and in-store sales of British video games.
The moves on piracy have been widely welcomed, although the BPI, which represents the British recorded music industry, called the report “digital dithering”, adding that the proposals “are far too weak to achieve the Government’s clear target for significantly reducing illegal file-sharing”. The entertainment union BECTU welcomed the piracy proposals but, like the National Campaign for the Arts, has condemned another proposal to divert money from the BBC to fund content on commercial channels. The Musicians’ Union proposed that “the BBC should be encouraged to use any money left over from digital switchover to commission new programmes”. NESTA (the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) has declared its intention to work with other organisations to develop a rights framework “for publicly procured new media content which will allow secondary commercial exploitation and create extra public revenues”.