PLS Welcomes New Intellectual Property Minister

Publishers’ Licensing Services (PLS) has welcomed the confirmation of Feryal Clark MP as the new government minister responsible for intellectual property.

Ms Clark, who is Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for AI and Digital Government at the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), was confirmed on Friday 19th July as the new government minister responsible for the Intellectual Property Office and copyright, replacing Viscount Camrose, the former Minister for AI and Intellectual Property in the previous government.

Ms Clark is the Member of Parliament for Enfield North and has represented the constituency since 2019. Before becoming an MP, Ms Clark studied bioinformatics at the University of Exeter and later worked in the NHS. Whilst in opposition under Sir Keir Starmer’s leadership, she was given shadow roles in health and crime reduction.

The minister’s role includes responsibility for both intellectual property and artificial intelligence including AI regulation, AI opportunities, and digital public services. Ms Clark will therefore play an important part in the ongoing debate about the relationship between copyright and artificial intelligence. In 2021, the government published a National AI Strategy with the aim of making the UK a global AI superpower over the next decade. As part of that strategy, the previous government unsuccessfully attempted to introduce a wide new copyright exception for text and data mining for any purpose, which was fiercely opposed by the UK’s creative industries, and later abandoned the creation of a voluntary code of practice for the use of copyright protected works in AI. During that time, an increasing number of court cases in jurisdictions across the world have also been brought by rightsholders against AI developers, who have been accused of illegally copying and using content in the training of large language models.

Whilst it is unclear as to what specific action the new government will take to address creative industry concerns about copyright infringement carried out by AI developers, the Labour Party’s plan for the arts, culture and creative industries, published in March 2024, included a commitment to “support, maintain, and promote the UK’s strong copyright regime” and that finding a balance between protecting the creative industries and fostering innovation would require “thoughtful engagement” with both the creative sector and AI companies. However, the King’s Speech, which sets out the government’s legislative agenda for the next session of parliament, which took place on Wednesday 17th July, did not include a widely expected commitment to the introduction of an AI Bill.  

To help provide a voluntary solution to concerns expressed by rightsholders and AI developers, PLS is currently working with the Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA) and its other members to develop new collective licences for the use of copyright protected works in generative AI technologies. A new licence for text and data mining (TDM) is to be launched soon, with PLS planning a formal publisher consultation on two licences for workplace use of AI and in the training of generative AI models for later this year.   

PLS CEO Tom West said:

“I welcome Feryal to her new role and her appointment as minister responsible for intellectual property. Copyright, and its relationship with artificial intelligence, has been the subject of much debate in the UK and across the world over the past few years. As an organisation that’s been providing rights and licensing services to publishers for over 40 years, PLS believes that the UK’s ‘gold standard’ copyright framework is fit for purpose, and we will be pressing the government to uphold the current framework to not only continue to incentivise human creativity but also safeguard future growth in publishing and the UK’s creative industries.”

PLS Head of Policy and Communications Will Crook said:

“PLS is a proud champion of copyright and I’m looking forward to engaging with the new minister to update them on the voluntary collective licensing solutions that we’re helping to develop for generative artificial intelligence and the benefits it will bring to both rightsholders and AI developers. We believe that an effective and innovative licensing market, that includes a mix of voluntary direct and collective licensing, offers the best solution to not only rightsholders and the wider industry, but also to the AI developers using copyright protected content to innovate and train models, cementing a sustainable and potentially hugely successful partnership.”