DADVSI

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Protests against the law in Paris, May 6, 2006

DADVSI (abbreviation for "Droit d'auteur et droits voisins dans la société de l'information") is a French legislative proposal aimed at reforming copyright law . It is intended to implement Directive No. 29 of the European Union from 2001, which defines a framework for copyright in the member states.

The DADVSI template was submitted to the National Assembly office in November 2003 . The discussion on this was finally scheduled for December 20-22, 2005.

A few hours before the debate in Parliament began, Virgin's parliament rooms were used to advertise music downloads and to distribute download vouchers to MPs.

The law is criticized by the "Free Software Foundation France" because it criminalizes software that is used to play, copy and distribute copyrighted content.

Personalities, parties and positions

  • UMP : The UMP essentially supported the draft, but there were also individual deviants. Richard Cazenave and Bernard Carayon, who are mentioned more often below, should be mentioned among the deviants, as well as Christine Boutin and Alain Suguenot, who favored the culture flat rate .
  • UDF : The UDF saw a considerable need for improvement and protested several times against the urgency procedure. Most active for the UDF were François Bayrou and Jean Dionis du Séjour. Currently (12th legislative period) the UDF is a coalition partner of the UMP. The UDF wanted to finally implement the directive from 2001, for which the deadline was actually December 31, 2002, but as later showed, not at any cost.
  • PS , CR , Greens: These parties took all means at their disposal against the draft. Christian Paul, Patrick Bloche, Didier Mathus, Didier Migaud, Frédéric Dutoit and Martine Billard were particularly active in the debate.
  • Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres is Minister for Culture and Communication in the legislature in which the bill was discussed in Parliament. But he neither wrote nor had them written.
  • Jean-Jacques Aillagon , predecessor of Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, submitted the DADVSI draft to the National Assembly in 2003. So it has to be said that Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres defended Jean Jacques Aillagon's bill.

The procedure of urgency

The government chose the urgency procedure, with only one reading in the House of Commons and Senate , instead of the usual two readings. There are two possible motives for this: Either the implementation of a draft law is urgent, or the government wants to avoid a second reading.

However, the government can withdraw the urgency at any time, or a second reading can be organized despite the urgency. Voices from both the opposition and the UDF (e.g. François Bayrou) accused the government of deliberately choosing the date and urgency in order to push the bill through in a rush without causing a major debate in the country.

Special elements

This section explains some of the unique plans that have been featured.

La Riposte Graduée - the gradual return of fire

The amendments that were supposed to insert this mechanism into the draft were not approved by the Assemblée nationale . The section is only intended to show the aims of Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres with this bill.

Amendment 228 should allow the following mechanism:

  • the first violation is only punished with an email informing a user that he has committed a violation
  • the second violation is punished with a registered letter notifying a user of the second violation
  • the third offense is punished with up to 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros.

The government submitted this amendment on the evening of December 20th, after the debate had started. The "Commission des lois" discussed the amendment on December 21st at 9:00 pm and made the following change: The initial version of Amendment 228 did not presuppose an intent to breach, but provided that every Internet user was informed according to the "Riposte graduée “To pursue who has inadvertently committed a violation due to lack of care, for example a user who purchases music online in the actual belief that the offer is legal.

If an internet connection violation is found, the owner of the internet connection is suspected and guilty according to this proposal, unless he can prove his innocence.

In order to relieve the courts, the imposition of fines should be entrusted to an independent authority. For this purpose, certain framework conditions should be defined within which this independent authority should operate.

The term “riposte graduée”, or “graduated return of fire”, was originally chosen by Renaud Donnedieu de Vabes when he first mentioned this mechanism before the start of the debate, and was retained by the opposition. However, like the UMP, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres used the term “Réponse graduée”, ie “graduated answer” to refer to this mechanism. He himself used the term "Riposte graduée" again on June 7, 2006, when Jean Dionis du Séjour (UDF) asked for a second reading on this bill in the context of questions to the government.

It is unclear whether this mechanism should also be used for violations under Article 13, e.g. playing a DVD under Linux, or whether playing a DVD should immediately result in 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros.

Jean Dionis du Séjour (UDF), in his explanation of vote on 30 June, regretted that the Riposte Graduée concept, according to which the first infringement should only be answered with an e-mail referring to the infringement, should have been maintained even if many of the other proposed mechanisms, such as the Internet private police, are not acceptable.

Article 13 and the ban on open source DVD players

This article was not approved by the House of Commons and is only intended to show the aims of Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres with this bill.

If the submission had been approved by Parliament unchanged, as the Minister of Culture Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres put it up for discussion in December 2005, playing a DVD under Linux would result in a prison sentence of 3 years and a fine of 300,000 euros, as well as to making, distributing, or hosting an open source DVD player.

Paragraph 1 of Article 13 should prohibit attacking technical protection measures in any way, paragraph 2 of Article 13 should prohibit the creation or importation of a device which allows or facilitates the circumvention of technical protection measures, paragraph 3 should make such a device available to forbid. Violations of the prohibitions should be punished as "forgery" and thus be punished with the above-mentioned penalty of 3 years imprisonment and 300,000 euros.

Since the source code of free DVD playback programs, such as VLC media player , decrypts the data for playing CSS-encrypted DVDs, and the source code could easily be manipulated so that the decrypted data is branched into a file, disseminating the source code would be a Programs that play DVDs, that is, under paragraph 2 of Article 13, are considered "fakes", the use of such a program would be considered a forgery according to paragraph 1, and hosting according to paragraph 3 as a forgery.

Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres denied this interpretation during the debate, but did not explain why he thought it was wrong.

The culture flat rate

The idea of ​​allowing copyright-protected works to be downloaded for a monthly fee was referred to as “La license global”, usually translated as culture flat rate. Since there was a lot of confusion around the culture flat rate, this is explained in a separate section .

Start of the debate

It became clear early on that the 3 days that were scheduled for debate would not be sufficient: the opposition submitted 3 motions de procédure, i.e. motions to reject a draft, which will be dealt with before the discussion of the individual articles begins. Several hours were needed for this alone. Those were:

  • exception d'irrecevabilité : Here the person who defends it explains why the draft is obviously unconstitutional and / or violates human rights
  • question préalable : Here the person who defends it explains why it is pointless to discuss a draft
  • renvoi en commission : Here the person who defends them explains why the draft is not yet ready and why the commission that "violated" it should get it back. The UDF joined the opposition.

All 3 motions de procédure were rejected by the majority of the Assemblée nationale . Another question préalable was submitted to the Senate ; when the compromise proposal of the mediation committee was discussed on June 30, the opposition again submitted an exception d'irrecevabilité and a question préalable (see here )

The UDF stated that it found both the urgency procedure for this draft and the choice of date to be very strange, but still wanted to finally start the debate. Therefore the UDF is voting against the exception d'irrecevabilité and against the question préalable . At the renvoi en commission , the UDF joined the opposition because the amendment had since been tabled and the UDF then changed its mind about continuing the debate.

The culture flat rate, its disappearance and the contracts

At the beginning of the debate in December 2005, figures were available according to which 8 million French people swapped files without the consent of the rights holder, that over 100 billion files are swapped worldwide every year, but on the other hand only a tiny number of those involved can be tracked down. Proponents of the Kulturflatrate argue that it is illusory to want to do anything about it, rather one should, for example, create remuneration for rights holders from the given situation through a copyright levy on Internet access instead of trying desperately to generate 8 million offenders.

Likewise, after years of repressive policies, sales of CDs in the US have fallen by 40%, so one must state that this policy has failed completely.

The decision

The proposal to allow the downloading of copyrighted works for a monthly fee was initially approved by the House of Commons with 30 votes in favor and 28 against and so included in Article 1 of the bill.

With the decision on the culture flat rate, it was now completely impossible to resolve the entire proposal by the morning of 23 December, since the culture flat rate for the government was not up for discussion even after this voting result. Accordingly, the debate was postponed on the night of December 22nd to 23rd.

The continuation

The debate did not resume until March 7th. The reason given by Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres that the urgency procedure was used because the implementation of the bill was urgent lost credibility with this long delay.

Since the demonstrations against the CPE were intensified from March 7, as announced, DADVSI played a very subordinate role in the French press in March as well.

The disappearance of the culture flat rate

In order to get rid of the culture flat rate, the government decided on the evening of March 6th to withdraw Article 1, now amended by the Assemblée nationale , and to submit an amendment that should add a new, alternative Article 1 to the bill.

An amendment must refer to an article. Amendment 272, which is at issue here, should insert an "additional article after Article 1" in the template. However, since Article 1 was withdrawn, the opposition was particularly interested in how an amendment could insert an additional article after an article that did not even exist.

Although it is foreseen that an article once withdrawn cannot be reinstated, the government reinstated the old article 1 on the evening of March 8th after, according to unofficial information, it was warned by a member of the Conseil constitutionnel that it would Withdrawal of Article 1 under the circumstances could not happen the censorship of the Conseil constitutionnel. Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres stated that the article, which was initially withdrawn, would be brought up for debate again to ensure that there was absolute clarity with all parties involved.

Patrick Bloche explained his amazement at first to learn that the government had removed Article 1 and the cultural flat rate from the draft law, and a day later to learn that the government wanted to put Article 1 and the cultural flat rate up for discussion again . He then went on to explain that he had a problem understanding what the government was really thinking .

The leader of the meeting at the time spoke of an innovative approach by the government.

Henri Emmanuelli sparked protests when he said the following to Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres: We are on the way, I will stay there too. You have withdrawn the article, Minister. Given how ridiculous you are making the Assemblée nationale, and considering how ridiculous you are too, the government, I wonder if the problem might not be more of withdrawing the Minister!

On March 16, the Ratiatum published a report according to which the chairman of the Assemblée nationale , Jean-Louis Debré, said of Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres: [He is] a zero who has given us the shit and who has given us since Beginning [of the debate], plunged into an adventure .

This coming and going of Article 1 and the culture flat rate was the subject of the complaint before the Conseil constitutionnel, which had to decide whether the principle of clarity and seriousness of the parliamentary debate had been violated. He ruled on July 27th that, contrary to government claims, the withdrawal of an article that had already been amended by parliament was unconstitutional, but that the timely reintroduction of article 1 had corrected this mistake.

Connection with the contracts between publishers and the Ministry of Education

The Assemblée nationale found out about this only by chance on March 8, when the MPs read agency reports during a break in the session.

During the debate about some sous-amendments to Amendment 272, the aim of which was to include additional rights for libraries and educational institutions in Amendment 272, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres repeatedly expressed his aversion to such rights and referred to contracts that allegedly already existed on December 20 had been signed. However, he had so far refused to show the contracts on the basis of which he wanted to achieve the rejection of the exceptions.

When he referred again to the contracts and again asserted that they were being copied, François Bayrou (UDF) asked for a break from the session in order to fetch and read them.

The MEPs then read agency reports because the copies were not ready and learned that Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres wanted to put the withdrawn Article 1 up for discussion again. François Bayrou then stated that the Assemblée nationale could no longer accept such behavior and that MPs from all ranks, whatever their opinion on copyright law, must refuse to take part in this theater.

As it later emerged, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres actually tried to keep the treaties secret for as long as possible, in the hope that Parliament would refuse to include additional rights for libraries and educational institutions in law on the basis of treaties it does not know .

Patrick Bloche accused Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres of having fooled the Assemblée nationale .

The Vivendi Universal amendment

The best-known amendment is Amendment 150, which was given the name 'Amendment Vivendi Universal', which was also used by the opposition during the public sessions of the debate. In the Senate it was also used by the UDF. The name comes from the fact that the proposal for this clause came from Vivendi Universal .

The clause, as it was initially submitted, provided that anyone who knowsingly would be punished with 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros

  • 1 ° makes a device publicly accessible, in whatever form, which obviously serves to make copyrighted works inadmissibly publicly available
  • 2 ° to use a device falling below 1 °.

The amendment Vivendi Universal in the Assemblée nationale

The clause was initially softened by the Assemblée nationale :

  • Sous-Amendment 363 replaced device with software
  • Sous-Amendment 364 added 3 ° and excluded software used for research, collaborative work or the exchange of files or objects that were not subject to remuneration under copyright law. This Sous-Amendment is also named after the two MPs who campaigned for it, as Sous-Amendment Carayon / Cazenave after Bernard Carayon and Richard Cazenave.

However, at Christian Vanneste's request, the amendment Vivendi Universal was tightened in a certain way:

  • Sous-Amendment 398 also threatens the creation of such a device with 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros
  • Sous amendment 399 also threatens the offenses recorded in 1 ° and 2 ° in the form of an advertisement.

The following were rejected:

  • Sous amendment 324, the aim of which was to cover only software that is used exclusively for the actions criminalized in 1 °
  • Sous-Amendment 376, which should limit the Vivendi Universal amendment to software that is used commercially

Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres expressed his approval of the Sous Amendments 363, 364, 398 and 399 and approved Amendment 150, only on condition that they would be approved by the Assemblée nationale .

François Bayrou (UDF) explained that it could be very difficult to find a program that is not protected by 3 °. He also stated that this clause made it completely impossible to apply Amendment 150 to any software and regretted that the Assemblée nationale wanted to make an amendment, which was of concern to all members of parliament, completely ineffective by means of a sous-amendment, only for certain interest groups to do a favor instead of simply voting against the amendment itself. He feared that such an article might be unconstitutional.

A few minutes after this Amendment 150 was approved by the Assemblée nationale , Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres received an additional nickname on the Framasoft forum : Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres de Vivendi. Socialist MP Didier Mathus told Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres the next morning that he had received this new nickname.

During the debate in the Assemblée nationale , the name “Vivendi” was mentioned at least 30 times on March 15th and 16th.

The Vivendi Universal amendment in the Senate

In May 2006, the Senate removed the changes that Sous Amendments 363 and 364 had made to the Vivendi Universal amendment (Amendment 22). Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres expressed his approval for this motion, which removed the defuses that the Assemblée nationale had made, and retained the tightening.

The following motions were rejected by the Senate:

  • Amendment 159 provided for the deletion of Article 12 bis, which was inserted by the Vivendi Universal amendment
  • Amendement 55 stipulated clearly by expressly to replace, to move from a subjective to an objective criterion
  • Amendment 42 (withdrawn) and Amendment 214 provided for the replacement of incitement to use by incitement to use improperly . The approval of this amendment would have prevented, for example, the imposition of 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros for the proposal to download an image of a Linux distribution using a program recorded by 1 °. Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres explicitly stated that he did not want this.

The amendment Vivendi Universal in the mediation committee

The Mediation Committee restored the version that the Assemblée nationale had approved in March, i.e. the Sous Amendments 363/364, which were initially not included in the Vivendi Universal amendment, then inserted with the consent of Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres and then with consent were removed again by Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres.

Current version

The clause stipulates that anyone who knowsingly will be punished with 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros

  • 1 ° creates software, makes it publicly available in whatever form, which obviously serves to make copyrighted works publicly available without permission
  • 2 ° encourages the use of software that falls below 1 °

Note: The following 3 °

  • 3 ° This article does not apply to software used for research, collaborative work or file sharing that is not subject to copyright remuneration.

was declared unconstitutional by the Constitutional Council because it was too imprecise.

Interoperability

The Assemblée nationale had modified Article 7 of the bill so that it guaranteed interoperability .

The Assemblée nationale interoperability clause

Article 7 provided that

  • a technical protective measure must not prevent interoperability
  • anyone who wants to create interoperability is allowed to decompile in order to understand how it works and to be able to create interoperability
  • anyone who wants to establish interoperability, has the right to the publication of the specification of a protective measure and only the pure material costs are to be reimbursed for the publication (e.g. postage, costs for copying)
  • the publication of the source code of software that is interoperable with a technical protective measure and only allows files protected in this way to be used legally and cannot be prohibited

Article 13, which was also modified, also allowed technical protective measures to be circumvented in order to establish interoperability. The Senate denied the motion to remove this exception. It is now in its final version.

In May, the Senate removed everything from Article 7 that guaranteed interoperability, and instead decided to set up a commission to process requests for the publication of such a specification and to approve or reject them, and which can determine "reasonable compensation" for the publication. The mediation committee decided on additional conditions for the establishment of interoperability.

Apple and the interoperability clause

Apple called this clause state-sponsored piracy and announced that it would withdraw from France if the clause survived the legislative process.

In connection with this article, particularly Apple's claim that it would be government-sponsored piracy if consumers had the right to play legally purchased music, many rumors have been spread that could give the completely false impression of the interoperability clause. It was even interpreted that if this clause ended up in the final law, Apple would have to offer music in different formats or in formats that work on all players, or that Apple would have to make the music Apple sells work on different players .

There is no basis whatsoever for such interpretations of the clause. The clause would oblige Apple, like any other provider of DRM systems, to release the necessary information to anyone who wants to achieve that their software or hardware can play these files; it would allow everyone to reverse-engineer the same information However, it would in no way oblige Apple or anyone else to support competing formats in their playback devices or playback software or to make devices of the competition interoperable with their own music sold.

The right to zero private copies

The rapporteur ("Le Rapporteur") of the Assemblée nationale for this draft law, Christian Vanneste, emphasized several times that this draft would not endanger private copying and pointed out that the Commission des lois had proposed an amendment that guaranteed private copying. This Amendment 30 stated that in the case of technical measures that allow a limitation of the number of copies, this number must be at least one if the work was legally acquired.

When Amendment 30 was to be put to the vote, Christian Vanneste withdrew the same, on the grounds that he did not want to write in the law that a private copy of a legally acquired work was guaranteed. He continued to insist that private copying be guaranteed without this amendment. From this, the opposition derived the interpretation that at least zero private copies were guaranteed.

This view was confirmed by the Senate in May 2006 when an identical amendment was rejected.

DRM versus spyware and viruses

The Senate's draft stipulated that it was inadmissible to incorporate any type of spyware into a protective mechanism without the prior approval of the CNIL . He decided this with the Sous Amendment 284, which was accepted against the will of Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres. Accordingly, the Mediation Committee removed the same at its meeting on June 22nd.

Articles 13 and 14 forbid knowingly bypassing, changing or neutralizing a protective mechanism. They also prohibit the creation, distribution, suggestion or import of devices specifically designed for this purpose. However, exceptions apply here. It is permissible to bypass or neutralize a protective mechanism if

  • this is used for research
  • this is done for the security of a system.

Making a repair copy of an Un-CD to play it in a player that cannot read the original or playing a DVD under Linux using an open-source DVD player such as VLC is no longer a criminal offense.

Likewise, a mechanism such as the Sony rootkit can be safely neutralized, which camouflages all files whose names begin with $ sys $ and thus offers a hiding place to any virus whose author knew this. The Sony rootkit thus endangers the security of a system and falls under the exceptions.

The exception originally contained, which allowed a technical protective measure to be circumvented if this serves interoperability, was declared unconstitutional on July 27th due to a lack of definition of interoperability.

DADVSI bugged?

In an article published on agoravox , the author pointed out a possibly unintentional editorial error due to which DADVSI would continue to allow private copying in many cases, even if the aim of the bill was to essentially prevent private copying.

In French copyright law, effective technical protective measures have been legally protected since DADVSI came into force, as in Germany, but only if the protective measure prevents actions that were not allowed by the rights holders. If one circumvents an effective technical protective measure in order to be able to carry out an action that was allowed by the rights holders anyway, the prohibitions do not apply - the article is based on this assumption.

Circumventing an effective technical protective measure in order to be able to make a private copy is therefore only punishable if the rights holders, including the author, do not allow a private copy of the work (allow is not to be confused with wish or the like) if they forbid them.

However, Article L.122-5, paragraph 2 ° of the Intellectual Property Code (“Code de la propriété intellectuelle”) states that an author cannot prohibit the production of copies or reproductions for exclusively private and non-shared use.

Should courts follow this interpretation, it would appear that circumvention of an effective technical protective measure for the purpose of making a private copy cannot fall under the circumvention prohibition. However, this will only be clear after the first judgments.

Punish

The creation of software, which obviously serves to make protected works inadmissibly accessible to the public, as well as inciting the (legal as well as illegal) use of such software are punished by the amendment Vivendi Universal with 3 years imprisonment and a fine of 300,000 euros. This does not apply to software that is used for research, collaborative work or the exchange of files that are not subject to copyright compensation.

Bypassing a protective mechanism is charged with 3750 euros, with the exceptions listed under DRM versus spyware and viruses . The mediation committee retained the exceptions.

According to current plans, an act of illegal downloading should be charged with 38 euros if no upload is included, and 150 euros if upload is included. However, since an "act" has not yet been defined, it is completely unclear how, for example, the illegal downloading of an album would be punished: One act for the album or one act per title? Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres repeatedly refused to answer this question.

The Conseil constitutionnel declared it unconstitutional to distinguish between the offenses of the upload and the “tool” (peer-to-peer, other), which is incompatible with the principle of equality before criminal law. Since the 150 euro fine should only apply to peer-to-peer, the old penalty for forgery, i.e. 300,000 € and 3 years imprisonment, applies to the upload after the censorship of the Conseil constitutionnel.

Conciliation Committee in June 2006 and opposition

On June 15, 2006, the Mediation Committee ("Commission Mixte Paritaire", "CMP") was officially announced by Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin . It was scheduled for June 22nd. Usually this happens if, after two readings in both chambers of parliament, there are still differences between the two texts that were last approved by the chambers. However, due to the urgency procedure, this is possible after a reading.

Resistance to its convocation

There was resistance to this approach from all sides, including from the two governing parties UMP and UDF:

  • the opposition constantly demanded that the entire bill be withdrawn, or at least that the urgency procedure be abandoned
  • During the debate in the Assemblée nationale in March, the UDF asked several times that the urgency procedure be abandoned
  • on June 1st, Hervé Morin (UDF) published the official request to organize a second reading
  • On June 7th, during the questions to the government, Jean Dionis du Séjour (UDF) asked if the urgency would be lifted and asked Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres to let Parliament do its job.
  • On June 14, Richard Cazenave and Bernard Carayon (UMP) issued a statement saying that the modifications made by the Senate were too extensive to warrant a conciliation committee rather than a second reading. They said the choice the Senate made was no longer a balance between authors 'rights and consumers' rights. They especially mentioned
    • removing the interoperability clause that guaranteed interoperability; and introducing a means of negotiating interoperability
    • the restoration of the old amendment Vivendi Universal
    • the introduction of the filtering of the Internet, in which neither the financing nor the integration of foreign artists is clear
    • the fact that the Senate provides that anyone who owns a wireless connection is responsible for the acts of a “connection pirate” who misuses that wireless connection
  • On June 21, 12 members of the UMP, including Alain Suguenot and Yves Bur as well as Richard Cazenave and Bernard Carayon, sent an open letter to the parliamentary group leader, Bernard Accoyer, demanding the return of the National Assembly's far-reaching interoperability clause and urging him to do the following To take note and to represent:
    • It is positive that the principle will return, according to which a technical protective measure should not prevent the efficient implementation of interoperability
    • The return of the principle that the necessary information is made available in an open standard is also positive
    • Obtaining the information necessary to establish interoperability should not be subject to any conditions.
    • apart from the postage costs, no costs should be calculated
    • that the applicant must guarantee the effectiveness of a technical protective measure is disproportionate and vague
    • it is unacceptable that the publication of the source code of a program which is interoperable with protected files could be prohibited, as this would attack the rights of free software authors
    • They rate the adoption of the Amendment Vivendi Universal by the Assemblée nationale, i.e. with the exception of research, collaborative work and legal file sharing, as positive
    • Article 14 ter A of the Senate reverses the burden of proof for victims of Internet access piracy, which is dangerous
    • Article 14 quater could be misinterpreted (if a program is used on a commercial scale for copyright infringement, the manufacturer can be forced to implement countermeasures)

procedure

The mediation committee met on June 22nd. None of the 12 members of the UMP who signed the letter to Bernard Accoyer were allowed to attend. A “joint version” was produced by means of 55 amendments, which was then submitted to the Assemblée nationale and the Senate on June 30th .

The opposition representatives (Christian Paul, Patrick Bloche, Serge Lagauche, David Assouligne, Marie-Christine Blandin) were refused an interruption in the session, the aim of which was to read the motions and thus decide for which and which to vote wanted to.

Shortly thereafter

On June 23, Richard Cazenave published a letter in which he expressed his dissatisfaction with the final version. The March version, which contained a far-reaching interoperability clause, had still been approved; however, he announced that he would vote against those of the Mediation Committee.

Bernard Carayon published a letter of similar tenor with Michel Rocard . This was the first public statement against DADVSI that was jointly supported by a member of the UMP and a socialist. The two became very clear, also criticized the artificial segmentation of the market by region codes and asked why a DVD can be sold in China for $ 1.50, but not in Europe, and whether DVDs in China are sold at a loss .

Choice of date and submission of the compromise to both chambers

On June 30, the compromise that had been worked out was presented to both chambers of parliament. The date was set no sooner than June 27th. The choice of the date was a bit strange as Parliament doesn't actually work Friday. The MPs are in their constituencies on Fridays, just like Mondays, or have other appointments.

Richard Cazenave, Alain Suguenot, Yves Bur and Bernard Carayon, all of whom had signed the letter to their group leader, had had other appointments that day for months. Richard Cazenave, for example, had to chair a meeting of a commission, of which he is himself president, and which had been scheduled for 6 months. Yves Bur had to represent the Assemblée nationale in the European Parliament, Bernard Carayon also had to take part in another conference.

The only one of the 12 who were able to participate that day was Nicolas Dupont-Aignan. According to the rules of the Assemblée nationale, an absent MP can join the vote of another member of the same party, but each can only have one “joining vote”. Alain Suguenot joined Nicolas Dupont-Aignan's vote against, unfortunately the debate dragged on so long that Nicolas Dupont-Aignan could not stay. The UMP could thus claim that its MPs had agreed to the text.

In the debate, the opposition used every opportunity to point out the dangers of the law again, and François Bayrou (UDF) agreed on many points. As in December before the beginning of the first reading, the opposition submitted an exception d'irrecevabilité (defended by Patrick Bloche) and a question préalable (defended by Martine Billard).

François Bayrou joined the opposition in the vote on the exception d'irrecevabilité .

Complaint to the Constitutional Council

The socialist party filed a complaint against the law, both for substantive and formal reasons, before the Conseil constitutionnel . Some MPs from other parties also signed the complaint:

  • UDF: François Bayrou, Hervé Morin
  • Greens: Noël Mamère, Martine Billard, Yves Cochet
  • CR: André Chassaigne, Frédéric Dutoit, Jacqueline Fraysse, Jean-Pierre Brard

Formally, the complaint goes against the comings and goings of Article 1, which the government withdrew after the Assemblée nationale had approved the amendment to the cultural flat rate, and which it then reintroduced so that it could be rejected. The proceedings of the mediation committee are also the subject of the complaint.

In terms of content, it is directed against the illegibility of some articles, such as B. the amendment Vivendi Universal.

The Conseil constitutionnel can declare a law unconstitutional for formal reasons if, for example, the parliamentary debate was not clear and serious. The opposition hopes this will be determined in the context of the comings and goings of Article 1 and the culture flat rate.

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