TNAG-0265-FCO40-301-Legislation-for-copyright-in-Hong-Kong-1970 — Page 87

just as RTV

and it lobby will be if we prozac

Ith govt's

propramen basis

Mas

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CONFIDENTIAL

- 5 -

In paragraph 4, you ask whether experience in the past two years has caused us to reach any conclusion as to the validity of the arguments there set out. I do not think that we have ever accepted that TVB could not operate commercially at all, or that the element of competition would be destroyed, if RTV could relay at will, and the position about advertising revenue and advertising charges is uncertain and has to be related to programme costs. It might be that TVB could raise advertising charges if its broadcasts were relayed by RTV, but the view preferred here is that not only is this not so but also that TVB might have to pay more for its programmes if they are relayed. It is probably true, broadly speaking, that TVB's best interest lies in a continuous increase in the number of wireless television receiving sets in use. To that extent, it has an obvious interest in restricting relay in local conditions, and experience has shown that the public interest does not require the provision of relay services, except of the ADS type. So many factors are at work that conclusive answers to the questions in paragraph 4 of your letter cannot be given. The only sure ground in the whole matter is that relay rights are part of the property of a broadcasting company in its broadcasts, whether or not they are of direct commercial value to it. Such rights will always have a negative value.

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In the light of the foregoing, as I have said, this is not a matter which can be left to the two Companies and there is no point in attempting to bring them together for further consultations. In any case the Deputy Colonial Secretary's attempt in 1967 to get the parties to settle the matter between themselves was severely rebuffed.

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Finally, I cannot agree to the introduction of this legislation without clause 4. On the one hand, I believe that the principle to which we are trying to give legal effect is right; on the other, I am quite sure that TVB would be up in arms, demanding to know why we had reversed our policy and how we justify the introduction of a law which failed to give adequate copyright protection for its broad- casts against its competitor. I do not see what convincing answer we could give. Our aim must be to introduce the right law giving the protection which is proper before third and even fourth parties appear on the scene, and we must remember that a licence under the Television Ordinance is valid for only five years at a time. I think that a compromise on this matter might hamper the Government's freedom of action in dealing with the licence in future.

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I now ask that :-

and in

Part here

mw.

(a) the draft copyright legislation; and

(b) the proposal that RTV should not have a

monopoly of the provision of ADS,

be put to Ministers forthwith, so that the Order in Council can be made and the Copyright Bill introduced into the Legislative Council with a view to testing local public reaction and the added advantage of finding out how strongly the Companies still feel. In making this request, I am mindful of the risk of further challenge to the legislation in the courts, but the only alternative (the enactment in full of our own copyright legislation) has already been ruled out by both your legal advisers and the Board of Trade.

/17 There is

CONFIDENTIAL