Press Release – Page 29 of 61 – Pirate Party Australia

Trans-Pacific Partnership IP Chapter Leaked: Enforcement Provisions Abound

Posted on November 14, 2013

The overnight release of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement’s draft intellectual property chapter has exceeded Pirate Party Australia’s worst fears. While the Party is yet to undertake a thorough analysis of the draft, there are already some provisions that are glaringly ill-considered.

Despite numerous assurances from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) the TPP would not require changes to domestic intellectual property legislation, the draft text indicates that substantial legislative changes would be required if the United States and Australia got its way. These changes may include the criminalisation of “significant willful copyright […] infringements that have no direct […] motivation of financial gain.”

“This corporate wishlist masquerading as a trade agreement is bad for access to knowledge, access to medicine, and access to innovation. It re-enforces the worst parts of our intellectual property enforcement regime on a regional level, making the necessary positive reforms for the digital era much more difficult, if not impossible,” said Brendan Molloy, Councillor of Pirate Party Australia.

“It is absolutely appalling that we are still relying on leaked texts to determine just what we’re getting ourselves into with these trade agreements. Even Parliament is being kept in the dark. It’s time to release the text, and all future texts, so that transparency and oversight can result in texts that help, not hinder, legitimate Australian interests. There is no economic justification for the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement’s intellectual property provisions. DFAT must immediately hold public briefings to explain their now public negotiating positions. It’s time for some accountability.”

The Australian delegation is attributed with the minority in many cases, often siding with the US. The current text would require the accession of all parties to several other intellectual property agreements in order to be a member of this agreement, endangering any future positive reform efforts due to layering of treaties. The US is pushing for pharmaceutical provisions that the Australian delegation is standing against.

Campbell’s G20 Police State approaches

Posted on October 31, 2013

The Queensland Parliament recently passed bizarre new security legislation ahead of the 2014 G20 Summit in Brisbane. The G20 (Safety and Security) Bill contains a significant number of vague provisions that give an overwhelming amount of power to law enforcement personnel. Included are abilities to forcibly detain, strip search, or even X-ray anyone within declared areas at the discretion of a police officer. Anything ‘capable of disrupting’ the Summit is prohibited in declared areas, as are “chains, cables or anything else capable of securing objects.”[1]

“These measures are disproportionate, poorly defined, and give far too much discretion to law enforcement agents,” said Melanie Thomas, Deputy President of Pirate Party Australia. “They have the potential to substantially undermine the liberties and dignity of Brisbane residents to an unnecessary extent. For four days in mid-November, people’s lives will be disrupted and many Brisbane residents are likely to be stripped of their rights, liberties, clothes and dignity to accommodate the lockdown.”

Police Minister Jack Dempsey has stated that residents who fail to pass criminal background checks will be prevented from entering restricted zones[2]. Convicted criminals residing within these zones may be temporarily relocated at the taxpayers’ expense[3]. This approach is unnecessarily discriminatory, and, given the restricted zones cover the Brisbane CBD and Southbank, will doubtless affect many residents with criminal records.

Unfriended and blocked: DFAT bars journalists from attending TPP briefing

Posted on October 29, 2013

Pirate Party Australia has received confirmation that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) has rescinded confirmations of attendance for journalists[1][2] to the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement briefing to be held in Sydney at 4pm on 30 October, stating that the meeting is “off-the-record”, and that journalists are not welcome[3].

DFAT has also removed all references to the event from their website. The original content from that page is still available on a website planning to protest during the briefing[4].

“This proves empirically that the Government has something to hide regarding the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. There is absolutely no justification for barring any Australian from attending a briefing regarding a trade agreement, especially one as opaquely negotiated as the TPP,” said Brendan Molloy, Councillor of Pirate Party Australia.

Privacy concerns over mall tracking: safeguards needed now

Posted on October 29, 2013

Plans to track visitors of Brisbane’s Queen St Mall have renewed privacy concerns around commercial tracking systems[1]. Pirate Party Australia says that while anonymous tracking has commercial benefits, there must be strict limitations around how such systems work, including independent privacy impact assessments and transparent operation.

“The major concern here is to ensure that customers know they are being tracked and how,” said Simon Frew, President of Pirate Party Australia. “We must ensure forms of monitoring are carefully examined so that members of the public are informed and can feel safe. Tracking itself is not the problem, and there are certainly many positive outcomes of anonymous and voluntary tracking systems.”

“There is a need to assess the impact such systems have on privacy, and to confirm they are operating in the way intended. It should also be necessary to meet minimum data security requirements to make sure that only anonymous data is collected and that access is restricted in case something goes wrong.”

Brandis calls for solution to non-problem: file sharing

Posted on October 28, 2013

The Australian reported today that Attorney-General George Brandis has sent letters to copyright holders and ISPs to organise discussions on the best way to stop file sharing. The article suggests plans are afoot to create a censorship regime to block sites that enable file sharing[1].

Pirate Party Australia condemns any plan to install a censorship regime, whether it is to block ‘objectionable content’ (as attempted by the previous government) or to block access to websites that may include unauthorised copyrighted material.

“Yet again we are faced with a government that is an enemy of the Internet,” commented Simon Frew, President of Pirate Party Australia. “Previous Attorney-Generals organised secret meetings between ISPs and the copyright lobby, deliberately excluding consumers, and now history repeats. We demand that any consultation about the future of the Internet be conducted transparently and include competent and trusted representatives of the community, not just vested interests.”