Mr. Eaton
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Reference...
CR 4/2/44
Hong Kong Copyright
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I understand that this subject now falls to you. There are two documents for us to approve which were sent with the Governer's Saving Despatch No.211 of 10 February 1968, namely, a draft Order in Council extending the United Kingdom Copyright Act to
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Hong Kong with modifications and a draft Ordinance te be made by Hong Kong supplementing the Act as so extended.
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2. It seems that the Board of Trade have had the
carriage of Orders of the present kind and lay them before Her Majesty in Council. This seems to me a little odd since I would have expected that the Minister who would advise Her Majesty te make an Order which, in effect, is to be law in a colony would have been the Minister to whom Her Majesty had committed the United Kingdom responsibility for colonies. Notwithstanding that the practice seems to me constitu- tionally wrong, it has been followed in all previous cases and I cannot advise that it should not be followed in the present instance.
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3. I'm afraid there has been some delay in dealing with this. The subject is very complex. Mr.Beattie
suggested in his minute to Mr. Butterfield of 3 March
that we might like te consult the Board of Trade lawyer. This I did and she brought with her Mr.Davis, a copyright expert. Eventually, further advice was received from the Board of Trade in Mr. Wallace's
letter of 17 April. Since then I have been told that the legal adviser of Rediffusion Ltd. wished to call
and discuss the matter. However, a week has elapsed
and I have net heard from him.
4.
The principal point arising on these documents concerns their effect on Rediffusion (Hong Kong) Ltd.
That company has a licence issued to them under the
Hong Kong Telecommunications Ordinance and it seems that the effect of omitting Section 40(3) of the Copyright Act from that Act, as proposed to be extended to Hong Kong, would be that that company would be deprived of their right to diffuse television broadcasts by wire. The papers sent with the Governor's Despatch show that this effect was considered by the Hong Kong Executive Council but do
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No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.