03 April 2009

HADOPI Law Passed - by 12 Votes to 4

What a travesty of democracy:

Alors que le vote n'était pas prévu avant la semaine prochaine, les quelques députés présents à l'hémicycle à la fin de la discussion sur la loi Création et Internet ont été priés de passer immédiatement au vote, contrairement à l'usage. La loi a été adoptée, en attendant son passage en CMP puis au Conseil Constitutionnel.

On peine à en croire la démocratie dans laquelle on prétend vivre et écrire. Après 41 heures et 40 minutes d'une discussion passionnée sur le texte, il ne restait qu'une poignée de courageux députés autour de 22H45 jeudi soir lorsque l'Assemblée Nationale a décidé, sur instruction du secrétaire d'Etat Roger Karoutchi, de passer immédiatement au vote de la loi Création et Internet, qui n'était pas attendu avant la semaine prochaine. Un fait exceptionnel, qui permet de masquer le nombre important de députés UMP qui se seraient abstenus si le vote s'était fait, comme le veut la tradition, après les questions au gouvernment mardi soir. Ainsi l'a voulu Nicolas Sarkozy.

...

Quatre députés ont voté non (Martine Billard, Patrick Bloche et deux députés non identifiés), et une dizaine de mains se sont levées sur les bancs de la majorité pour voter oui. En tout, 16 députés étaient dans l'hémicycle au moment du vote.

[Via Google Translate: While the vote was not expected until next week, the few members in the chamber at the end of the discussion on the Creation and Internet law were invited to proceed immediately to vote, contrary to custom.The law was passed, until it passes then CMP in the Constitutional Council.

It is difficult to believe in democracy in which we aim to live and write. After 41 hours and 40 minutes of passionate discussion on the text, there remained only a handful of courageous members around 22:45 Thursday evening when the National Assembly decided, on the instructions of the Secretary of State Roger Karoutchi to pass immediately to vote on the Creation and Internet law, which was not expected before next week. One exception, which allows you to hide the large number of UMP deputies who would have abstained if the vote had been, as tradition dictates, after the government issues Tuesday night. Thus wished Nicolas Sarkozy.

...

Pack is voted. Four members voted no (Martine Billard, Patrick Bloche and two unidentified deputies), and a dozen hands were raised on the banks of the majority to vote yes. In all, 16 MPs were in the chamber for the vote.]

So one of the most important, and contentious piece of legislation in recent years is passed by trickery. In this way, those pushing this law have shown their true colours and their contempt for the democratic process.

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22 comments:

Anonymous said...

Remember the French Revolution? I think it might be time for the French to dig out all those old guillotines again.

GreenReaper said...

This is why it's so important for elected officials to attend. It's your job; do it!

Anonymous said...

If this law is so contentious, perhaps the rest of the voters should vote to repeal it immediately, instead of just rolling over and accepting this maneuver.
I have a feeling that most of them will just allow it to stand unchallenged. Thus dies democracy

Anonymous said...

Read the article... they DID attend. The vote happened after most had gone home for the night (it was at 10:45pm!) expecting to be voting on the issue later in the week...

Anonymous said...

It would help understanding to know how many legislators are in this body. Reporting a vote of 12-4 needs context for the international audience.

Glyn Moody said...

You're right, I should have said that there are 577 seats: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assemblee_nationale

Anonymous said...

Hi
I'm French and not proud of it.
Such a law is a mockery of French Law, a mockery of the citizen, and a mockery of democracy.
Travellers baware : France is now The French Popular Repulic.

Anonymous said...

Amazing that the french "national assembly" has no regulations with regards to quorum , apparently. I assume that 16/577 (under three percent) of the legislators hardly satisfy reasonable quorum rules for legislation in other "democracies".

Glyn Moody said...

My understanding is that's it's due to some procedural rule that was invoked in this case....

shevy said...

I wonder that 16 people alone are enough to decide for several million people.

If we cut back 15, we could establish a new king of france.

Glyn Moody said...

L'État, c'est moi....

Anonymous said...

Vive le Roi. p

Fabrice Epelboin said...

I so much wish you where true, but the fact is nobody, among french political staff, gives a shit about this law. Only a few understand what's it's all about, most don't grasp the full problem but felt like not taking part to the vote because they would have voted yes and where 'afraid of the internet and those bloggers'. So the vote was organized in a way to minimized the headcount.

Except the green party, all party didn't opposed to the law, either left or right. Only a few parliament member opposed, those are now France's new e-demacracy heroes, but there's only five of them. Not enough for democracy to survive...

Glyn Moody said...

@Fabrice: that's incredibly depressing. Aren't they even worried about the *legal* aspects of guilt, by accusation, or of the power they are giving to *private* individuals?

Anonymous said...

@glyn moody: They literally have NO CLUE WHATSOEVER. The person responsible for this law, Ms. Albanel, was asked during the debate how she can simply accept the fact that this law makes distribution of Open Source software very difficult, and she answered something approximating "Well, of course Microsoft Office has a Firewall, but so does OpenOffice!"

A newspaper also recently asked several politicians "Which is the bigger menace, BitTorrent or P2P?" (that's a trick question, on purpose) NOT ONE of them knew what that really meant.

Glyn Moody said...

Frightening.

Anonymous said...

In France most politicians think its ok to punish an all group of people because one of them didn’t abide by the law. The French parliament has just voted a law that allows cutting the internet line of a group of people, a family or a business, if one of them downloads content without paying the copyright. If they want to avoid losing their internet line the French will have to spy on other members of their family or business to stop any illegal behavior related to copyright. Artist in France are much more clever than anywhere else (except maybe China or the ex Soviet Union). The French already pay many taxes that are supposed to offset the loss of income due to the infringement of copyright. Non only they pay taxes but They pay ( those who work in the private sector) through their social assurance premium huge amounts of money to allow hundreds of thousands of artists to get paid for nine months by the social insurance system when they have really work for three months ( “Regime des intermitents du spectacle”) . At the time where you can be robbed, raped or injured with impunity in big areas where millions of people live without any protection of the state ( the police refuse to go there because it’s too dangerous) it’s certainly more important to remind to the French that copying music on the internet is the ultimate crime ! It’s what does any teenager. Not surprising that in France medias use the word “ les jeunes” (meaning young people) to say punk or tout. You could imagine that so much money invested in French artist would encourage creativity! As a matter of fact where is our Bach Mozart or Vinci (a time when copyright didn’t exist.) Sure the creativity has never been so low but artist have never been more convinced that France need a more powerful state system (In France the state system get only 52 % of the total income)

Glyn Moody said...

I do wonder why the French put up with this...

Anonymous said...

we are now in China
remember how chineses told our police what to do during olympic travel in paris???
remember how chineses told us what to do with tibet and dalai lama, a nobel price???
remeber how they pick up tibetan flags but not chinese ones?? claming about terrorism with flags??
remember videos of a private funny tv showing chinese officials telling french offcials what was the laws of the day??
i love my country; my parents and friends still leave there; but all myfriends wanna leave somewhere else as soon as possible
we're fucked up by our own governement
i also heard marxism proposal in the mouth of our liberal president and "relance" minister wich son get a very new good job
like the president son.....
we don't live in a democracy

reine said...

do with bad communism!, it's feodality!, France looks like a republic but it's a royalty, a bad one. If you go to Holland, Sweden, Danmark, (they are royaltys), you have this feeling you are in a republic!, it's the contrary in F.....g france (all lower case, please!).

Anonymous said...

Only those who have something to hide will feel threatened by this law. As for "spying on one's family" etc., remember that it is a citizen's duty to alert authorities when they know that someone is engaging in criminal activity, even if that someone is a family member.

Glyn Moody said...

"those who have nothing to hide have nothing to fear" - well, in a perfect world, maybe, though I'm not convinced. Sadly, in this imperfect world it's certainly not true: just look at the UK, where so-called "anti-terrorism" laws are being used to spy on people who drop litter...

Once this stuff is in place, it will be abused. No ifs or buts. It's a privacy disaster.