Hargreaves implementation: draft regulations on copyright exceptions tabled before UK Parliament

Those several readers who have spent the past few years only thinking about the Hargreaves Review of Intellectual Property & Growth will promptly recall that on 7 March last UK Government announced that it was about to finalise the regulations that would import new copyright exceptions into UK law.

Yesterday a most distinguished and learned Katfriend alerted this Kat that these draft regulations would be laid before UK Parliament today for approval by resolution of each House of Parliament. 

This is indeed what happened.

Today the following draft regulations were in fact issued:

• The Copyright and Rights in Performances (Quotation and Parody) Regulations 2014
• The Copyright and Rights in Performances (Personal Copies for Private Use) Regulations 2014
• The Copyright (Public Administration) Regulations 2014
• The Copyright and Rights in Performances (Research, Education, Libraries and Archives) Regulations 2014
• The Copyright and Rights in Performances (Disability) Regulations 2014

The IPO has produced
a user-friendly guide
 on the changes and
their impact

As explained on the UK Intellectual Property Office website, 

"The changes make small [here the typical British self-deprecation may be misleading: in some cases, eg private copying, the changes are not so small] but important reforms to UK copyright law and aim to end the current situation where minor and reasonable acts of copying which benefit consumers, society and the economy are unlawful."

Subject to parliamentary approval, the new regulations will enter into force on 1 June 2014.

A special thanks to 1709 Blog's John Enser for the links to these statutory instruments, freely available (of course in the Svensson sense) on the Legislation website.

Click here for guidance and explanation from the Government on changes to copyright.