Slashdot Mirror
UK Culture Secretary Wants Website Ratings, Censorship
kaufmanmoore writes "UK culture secretary Andy Burnham calls for a website rating system similar to the one used for movies in an interview with the Daily Telegraph. He also calls for censorship of the internet, saying, 'There is content that should just not be available to be viewed.' Other proposals he mentions in his wide-ranging calls for internet regulation are 'family-friendly' services from ISPs, and requiring takedown notices to be enforced within a specific time for sites that host content. Mr. Burnham wants to extend his proposals across the pond and seeks meetings with the Obama administration."
The BBFC's job is classification, not censorship. It has no power to ban material or demand cuts in any material.
As of the Video Recordings Act 1984, video can only be legally sold or hired if it has been classified. (Consider the recent case of Manhunt 2 as an example.)
Indeed, the BBFC's name changed from "censors" to "classification" at the same time that the Act changed their job from that of classification to censorship. As summed up in a House of Lords debate:
"On Report, I spoke about the Video Recordings Act 1984. I did not repeat one of the juiciest pieces about it. Until that time, we had a British Board of Film Censors, which was not a censorship board. It classified films, and if it refused to classify them, they could still be shown with the permission of local authorities. The Video Recordings Act 1984 changed the board from being a classification board to being a censorship board because if a video recording was not approved by the board, it could not be shown at all. From being a classification board, it became a censorship board, but its name changed from being a censorship board to a classification board. George Orwell would have been proud."
but certification is only withheld where it's considered the material in question would breach the criminal law, usually the Obscene Publications Act.
That's one reason, but the class of material they will refuse to classify is slightly broader than that (e.g., see http://www.bbfc.co.uk/classification/c_R18.php ).
Now having said that, I agree with the main point of your post in that the problem is with the laws rather than the BBFC - in this case, the Video Recordings Act 1984, and the Obscene Publications Act (not to mention a new law that as of January 26 will criminalise possession of adult images considered "extreme" by the Government).
I think someone in Government had put a heavy paw on his shoulder in the interim because there was a interview on BBC Radio Four a few minutes ago in which he was much more reasonable - the word "voluntary" was used repeatedly and "censorship" was omitted - and, in any case, there was a counter-interview (didn't catch the interviewee's name or affiliation) which tore the whole thing to shreds - the probability of 100 per cent international cooperation on this issue was zero and, in the end, "policing" would best be done by parents taking responsibility rather than some half-baked State attempt which would be full of holes even before it was switched on.
In passing:
1. The Telegraph is a Tory newspaper and Burnham is Labour, so I can be sure that the most negative spin possible was put on the interview;
2. The notion of the British government negotiating with the US government on this issue is risible - the President-elect, as a former professor of constitutional law, would presumably tell it to retreat across the Atlantic with all possible haste.
There is a legal right to free speech - but no _absolute_ right to free speech - in the UK or any other EU state. To quote from the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms:
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
The exception for "protection of health or morals", in particular, opens up huge holes.