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Friday, 30 September 2016

The biggest benefit of Brexit might be the economic hit we take

If the City of London were to take a hit and the economy were to suffer as a result – which, as a Remainer and a Europhile, I tend to think it will – there is an argument to be made that the UK would actually be all the healthier for it.

Mary Dejevsky in The Independent

One of the messages declaimed most loudly by the Remain campaign before the UK referendum was a warning that Brexit would spell disaster for the City of London and the financial services that were now this country’s economic lifeblood. That message was also one of the most ill-judged of any during the whole campaign. Yet it seems that neither side has still quite got the point.

After denouncing what they branded “Project Fear”, victorious Brexiteers are now exulting in figures that supposedly show everything in the economic garden to be lovely. There you are, they say, the Remainers were just scaremongering, as we said all along. There is nothing to worry about in going it alone; indeed, if anything, the UK will benefit. They cite an upturn in consumer spending, no serious fall in house prices, no flight of the brightest and best, and no real uptick in inflation.

The Remainers for their part insist that the shocks are already creeping up on us and the worst is yet to come. The de facto devaluation in sterling may be helping exports and bolstering share prices, but it has already increased the cost of most foreign holidays, and higher prices of most imports will start to come through just as winter sets in. Any impression of economic strength, they go on, is mainly illusory, reflecting the effect of devaluation on the stock market and the Bank of England’s pre-emptive cut in interest rates. Only when the Government finally gets around to invoking Article 50, they maintain, so triggering the withdrawal process irrevocably, will the economic fallout really start to be felt.

This bickering over the economy, however – its talking up by one side and talking down by the other – is not only premature in the extreme, but misses one simple point. When the former Chancellor, George Osborne, and his friends in the City spread doom and gloom about the future of the city should Leave prevail, the response in many quarters was not entirely as they had scripted. Yes, there were some howls of empathetic anguish, but there were also shouts of hooray – some articulated, many not.

To forecast, as Osborne and others did, that the sky would fall in on London and the City’s hugely profitable financial services was also to hold out the promise of a time when there could be a return to a real economy made up of real things, rather than a virtual economy derived from onscreen speculation in funny money. To add, as some Remain frontpeople did, that there would also be a flight of foreign banks from the City and that house prices in London could fall only compounded the rebel calls to “bring it on”.

In trying to defend the city from what they saw as the Brexit threat, its advocates were – unwittingly, it must be assumed – making a compelling case for the opposition. One person’s high-paying City job is another person’s precarious gig existence. One person’s security from high and ever-higher house prices is another person’s exclusion from home ownership. You could hardly find a better illustration of the clash of interests and cultures exposed by the referendum.

And here I must admit that I have a lot more sympathy for the rebels than a London-based home-owning Remainer should. It also strikes me that, in insisting that the economy will continue to flourish, the Brexiteers risk giving a hostage to fortune and perhaps missing a trick. Because if the City of London were to take a hit and the economy were to suffer as a result – which, as a Remainer and a Europhile, I tend to think it will – there is an argument to be made that the UK would actually be all the healthier for it.

Now it may be that the city will not shrink. It may be that all the foreign banks and finance houses with a presence there will continue to regard London as a necessary base for their global operations, whether or not it remains a gateway to the European Union. We know all the arguments about the time zone, the language, the quality of life, the schools and the shopping, and perhaps they will prevail.

But if – as appears likely – London banks post-Brexit lose the “passporting” system that gives them direct access to the EU single market – a threat much bandied about during the campaign – and if foreign companies start to transfer their operations across the Channel; if the number of people able and willing to pay high-end London property prices falls (and the pool of such people seems to have been vastly overestimated by construction companies anyway); and if – just if – as a result the high tide of cash flooding the capital starts to recede, what then?

The Remain campaign predicted that the UK as a whole could be drastically poorer. Another possibility, though, is that London starts to dominate the national picture less than it does now. The “great sucking sound”, complained of by pro-independence Scots during their referendum, would quieten down, and the enormous disparity in wealth both within the south-east and between London and most of the rest of the country would be reduced.

Of course, nothing will change the fact that political and financial power are centred in one city in the UK, unlike, say, in the US or in Germany. But the outsized contribution that London currently makes to national GDP - 22 per cent for 12 per cent of the population - is disproportionate, and leaves most other parts of the country far behind. Even George Osborne conceded that the economic dominance of London had its downside and is one reason why he championed the “northern powerhouse” - that, and perhaps his Cheshire constituency.

At a time (2014) when he was riding high as leader of Ukip and the referendum was barely a glint in David Cameron’s eye, Nigel Farage told an interviewer that if a decline in GDP were the price to be paid for greater social cohesion, he would accept the trade-off. I suspected then, and believe still more firmly now, that many – and not only Brexiteers – would agree with him.

Given that recent increases in national GDP have been shared more inequitably in the UK than in almost any other developed country; given, too, the extent of London’s economic dominance, some evening out of the disparities is surely overdue. Could it even be that a necessary internal economic and social rebalancing is eventually judged – even by reluctant Remainers – to be an actual benefit of Brexit?

Thursday, 29 September 2016

Stop Brexit and save the EU

Anatole Kaletsky in The Guardian

The EU face five crises that could destroy it, and Brexit could be the detonator. But only modest changes could stop an implosion
 
Copies of German magazine Der Spiegel featuring the headline “Please don’t go!” Photograph: Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images




“Never let a crisis go to waste” has always been one of the European Union’s guiding principles. What about five simultaneous crises? Today, the EU faces what Frans Timmermans, the European commission vice-president, describes as a “multi-crisis”: Brexit, refugee flows, fiscal austerity, geopolitical threats from east and south, and “illiberal democracy” in central Europe. Rather than wasting its crises, the EU could be laid to waste by them.
If so, Brexit will be the detonator for that demolition. By legitimising the concept of an EU breakup, and so turning a fantasy among political extremists into a realistic option of mainstream politics throughout Europe, Brexit threatens to trigger an irresistible disintegration process. It will also transform economics, by paralysing the European Central Bank in the next euro crisis. The ECB can always defeat market speculation, but it is powerless against breakup pressures from voters.

The EU urgently needs to put the genie of disintegration back in its bottle. That means persuading Britain to change its mind about Europe, which, according to conventional wisdom on both sides of the English Channel, is impossible. But many “impossible” things are happening in politics nowadays.
The referendum majority on 23 June was much narrower than that in Scotland’s 2014 independence referendum, or the negative votes on EU treaties in Ireland, Denmark and the Netherlands, all of which were subsequently reversed. More important, the 52% who voted for Brexit were sharply divided in their aims, with some prepared to accept economic sacrifice for a “hard Brexit” - total separation from Europe - and others hoping for a “soft Brexit” that would minimise the impact on the UK economy.

According to post-referendum polling, three-quarters of leave voters expect Britain’s economy either to strengthen or to be unaffected by Brexit, and 80% believe the government will have more money to spend on public services as a result of their vote. Brexit voters are so optimistic because they were told - most prominently by the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson - that Britain could have its cake and eat it, a new deal that would preserve all of the economic benefits of EU membership with none of the obligations or costs.

When these expectations are disappointed, public opinion will change. Already,66% of voters say that maintaining market access is more important than restricting immigration if Britain is unable have both. This directly contradicts the prime minister Theresa May’s stated priorities, and probably explains why she refuses to talk about her Brexit strategy.

Because public expectations of an economically innocuous soft Brexit will be impossible to reconcile with the rejection of all EU obligations demanded by the Conservative party’s hard Brexit faction, May cannot win. Whichever course she chooses, she will antagonise half her party and a large proportion of Brexit supporters, not to mention the 48% of voters who want to stay in the EU.

Once this backlash starts, plenty of ambitious Conservative politicians whom May purged from government will be eager to exploit it. George Osborne, immediately sacked as chancellor when May took office, has already thrown down the gauntlet, challenging her democratic mandate: “Brexit won a majority. Hard Brexit did not.” Even the weakness of Britain’s opposition parties works against May, allowing opponents to plot against her, secure in the knowledge that they are unlikely to lose power.

All this implies that British politics will become very fluid as economic conditions deteriorate and voters start to change their minds. The EU should encourage such second thoughts, which means that it must stop treating Brexit as inevitable and instead offer the possibility of a compromise that would meet British voters’ concerns, but only on the condition that Britain remains in the EU.

The obvious way to accomplish this would be to conclude an EU-wide agreement on greater national control over immigration and other symbolic issues related to national sovereignty. Such an agreement need not be seen as a concession to British blackmail if it were extended to all EU countries and presented as a response to public opinion throughout the union.

By making a virtue of its response to democratic pressures, the EU could regain Europe-wide support. To send a positive message to voters European leaders will, however, have to rediscover the knack for pragmatic compromise and inter-governmental bargaining that used to be the hallmark of EU diplomacy.

For starters, defusing both Brexit and the refugee crisis will require some modest changes in immigration and welfare rules. Such reforms, which would be popular in almost all member countries, need not conflict with the EU’s founding principles if they preserve the right to work throughout Europe, but return some control over non-economic migration and welfare payments to national governments.




German business leader issues warning over post-Brexit trade with UK



Second, the interaction of the refugee and euro crises demands new fiscal rules. Dealing with immigrants is expensive and should ideally be funded by mutually guaranteed EU bonds. Alternatively, Mediterranean countries must be offered budgetary leeway, in exchange for assuming frontline responsibility for immigration controls.

Third, the need for immigration reform, combined with “illiberal democracy” in central Europe, calls for changes in EU spending priorities and foreign policy. Poland and other countries will accept restrictions on their citizens’ mobility only if offered additional structural funds and stronger security cooperation. Such incentives, in turn, could provide more levers to ensure respect for human rights.

Finally, restoring the EU’s democratic legitimacy means ending the institutional tensions between the eurozone and the broader union. The EU authorities must acknowledge that many member countries will never join the euro, which means abandoning their rhetoric about a “two-speed Europe,” with all heading – whether at high or low speed – toward the “ever closer union” that a single currency implies. Instead, the EU must reshape itself into two concentric circles: an inner core committed to deeper integration, and an outer ring whose voters have no interest in a single currency and a shared fiscal space.

Such reforms may seem impossible, but EU disintegration seemed impossible before the Brexit vote. In revolutionary periods, the impossible can become inevitable in a matter of months. This week, former French president Nicolas Sarkozy called unexpectedly for a new European treaty and a second British referendum on its EU membership. In Europe, a revolutionary period has begun.

Corbyn is an atheist – but his ideas are true to the Bible

Giles Fraser in The Guardian

Readings in the Church of England and the Roman Catholic church are set in advance on a three-year cycle. That’s partly to stop priests from constantly picking their favourite bits and partly to make sure all parts of the Bible are covered, even the tricky passages. Which means that, last Sunday, up and down the country, the same readings were read out to congregations. First we heard a stinging condemnation of wealth from the book of Amos: “Alas for those who lie on beds of Ivory, and lounge on their couches.” Then a psalm about God sustaining the widow and the orphan. Then a long passage about money – “Those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction” – from Paul’s first letter to Timothy. Then, to top it all off, the story from Luke of a rich man (“who was dressed in fine linen and feasted sumptuously every day”) burning in hell and a poor man, who lived homeless at his gate, being carried off to heaven by the angels.

Absolutely nothing that has been said by Jeremy Corbyn over the past few months is anything like as hostile to the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few as the Bible. Indeed, compared to the book of Amos and the gospel of Luke, the campaign group Momentum are a bunch of bland soft-pedalling apologists for the status quo. So how, then, can middle England sit through these readings without storming out, but apparently find Corbyn unelectable? Have they not been listening?

It’s five years next month since the Occupy protest arrived at St Paul’s cathedral. Though originally aimed at the London stock exchange, its impact on the cathedral and the wider church was, if anything, much greater. For what the protest dramatised was the deaf ear that the church and its members often turn when it comes to any reference to their wallets.

This week saw the 90th anniversary of the BBC broadcasting choral evensong. During every one of these the choir will have been encouraging revolution – bringing down the mighty from their thrones and lifting up the lowly, again from Luke’s gospel. On Thursday, they were singing this from Westminster Abbey, the heart of the establishment. Sedition hiding in plain view. And no one batted an eyelid. Which I suspect is evidence that people were listening to the wonderful music and ignoring what they were singing about.

But despite all the aesthetic chaff that the church throws out to misdirect the ear, it remains gobsmacking that, of all people, it’s the Tories that are still most likely to profess their commitment to the church. For heaven’s sake, Theresa May is a vicar’s daughter. There is the brilliant little bit in Godfather part III when Cardinal Lamberto is talking to Michael Corleone by a fountain in a cloister of the Vatican. “Look at this stone. It has been lying in the water for a very long time but the water has not penetrated,” the cardinal explains, “The same thing has happened to men in Europe. For centuries they have been surrounded by Christianity, but Christ has not penetrated.”

Even so, can it really be so inconceivable that Jeremy Corbyn’s political philosophy is inimical to the British people when he – atheism notwithstanding – is the only one who even approximates to Christian teaching about wealth. After all, Christianity is, like it or not, still the official religion of this country. And the Queen is its head. So you’d think that the Queen would be cheering on Corbyn, encouraging his bold redistributive instincts, and dismissing the Blairites for their fondness for Mammon. For, unlike Peter Mandelson, the Bible is not intensely relaxed about people getting filthy rich.

And if the Bible is to be taken literally, Donald Trump is headed for the fiery furnace. He shouldn’t boast how rich he is. He should be ashamed about it. After all, Trump says it’s his favourite book. Funny, isn’t it? When the Bible speaks about something like homosexuality, it has to be taken literally. When it speaks about money, it’s all a metaphor.

Wednesday, 28 September 2016

Britain is no paragon of sporting virtue – let’s stop pretending otherwise

Mary Dejevsky in The Guardian

As the latest scandal involving the ex-England manager Sam Allardyce and questions over cyclists’ drug exemptions show, the UK plays no fairer than anyone else

It started on the Iffley Road running track in Oxford, with Roger Bannister and the four-minute mile. It continued with Chariots of Fire, the filmed version of the same, and it was reinforced in the national consciousness with London 2012, the glorious festival of sport that everyone thought was going to be a disaster, but wasn’t.

Along the way came England’s victory (over Germany) in the 1966 World Cup, whose anniversary has been celebrated this year with mawkish nostalgia. And when the medals kept on coming, in this year’s Olympics and the Paralympics in Rio, the self-image of the UK as a highly successful and, of course, squeaky clean sporting nation seemed secure.
That image has been thoroughly discredited this week with the departure, by mutual consent, of the new England football manager, Sam Allardyce, after a mere 67 days. He was the subject of a Panorama exposé 10 years ago – and even I, as a football ignoramus, had caught the drift – which helped to explain why this “obvious” candidate for the England job had never been offered it before.

But now there he was, on camera, courtesy of a classic journalistic sting (by the Daily Telegraph), setting out how the rules of the transfer market could be circumvented, and considering a nice little supplement to his salary.

Nor, it would appear, is he alone in regarding the Football Association’s rules as an inconvenience to be challenged rather than a standard to be upheld. At least eight more guardians of the supposedly “national” game, it is claimed, agree with Sam Allardyce that ethics are for others upright or unambitious enough to heed them. The real pros know different.
If dubious practices were unique to football, that would be one thing. After all, everyone knows – do they not? – that there is far too much money sloshing round in the game generally, not least in England’s Premier League – money that is taking ticket prices out of reach of ordinary families and stifling the growth of homegrown talent.

We also know about the rot that set in long ago at Fifa, the headquarters of international football, so it is hardly surprising if something putrid also contaminates national organisations – including, alas, our own.

But it is not just English football, is it? Football may be the richest and most egregious example, but revelations in recent weeks suggest that question marks hang over other areas of UK sport. Nothing illegal, mind, nothing so crude as the“state-sponsored doping” we so loudly deplore in others, but little tweaks here and there, and especially close readings of the rule book that identify the opportunities between the lines.

So it is that the stellar success story of our times, Britain’s emergence as a world leader in cycling, looks slightly less glorious now that hacked reports have revealed the chemical help some cyclists were receiving – quite legally, it must be stressed – in order, as the people’s hero and multiple Olympic gold harvester Bradley Wiggins put it, to ensure “a level playing field”. Is a doctor’s note now to be considered part of sportsmanship?

And on the eve of the Rio Paralympics, there were reports of unhappiness within the British camp over allegations that classifications were being – how shall we say? – manipulated in the pursuit of more medals. We are sticklers for observing the letter of the law, it would seem, where the spirit of sport is concerned. But the story is starting to look a little different.

The shock here – if it is a shock – should not be that UK sports officials are as adept at playing the system as anyone else – within but sometimes also outside the law. It should rather be the persistence of the myth that only foreigners (especially Russians) cheat, and that British sport across the board – just because it is British – is cleaner, more honest and, yes, more innocent than everyone else’s. It isn’t.

The tyranny of numbers can often stymie selectors

Suresh Menon in The Hindu

Selectors must make inspired choices relying on instinct rather than the calculator.

In an essay, The Ethnic Theory of Plane Crashes, Malcolm Gladwell wrote about the hierarchical nature of Korean society that might have led to a plane crash. The junior pilot was so deferential to his senior that when the latter made a mistake, he didn’t point it out. Hierarchy in Indian society is well-established too.

Also, numbers slot people. Hence, the highest tax payer versus average payer, 100 Tests versus 10 Tests. It is the last that concerns us here.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India is being criticised for picking a five-man selection committee with a combined playing experience of 13 Tests and 31 one-dayers. The argument here is that only those who have played a large number of Tests are qualified to choose a national team (or perhaps even write about it!). The Cardusian counter is that one need not have laid an egg to be able to tell a good one from the bad.

If that sounds too cute, there is the empirical evidence available to those who have followed Indian cricket for long. A player with 50 or 60 Tests is not automatically qualified to recognise talent at an early stage or see a world in a grain of sand as it were.

Not all international cricketers are students of the game. I would rather talk cricket with someone like Vasu Paranjpe, the legendary coach, than with some players. To be able to play is a wonderful thing and admirable. Many players can demonstrate, but few can explain. Often the experience of 50 Tests is merely the experience of one Test multiplied 50 times.

Selectors must make inspired choices relying on instinct rather than the calculator. There are spinners or batsmen lurking in the thicket of Indian cricket who may not have the record but who are long-term prospects.

Retrospective judging

The successful selector can only be judged retrospectively. Often former players, conscious of how corrosive criticism can be, would rather be praised for sticking to the straight and narrow than invite censure for taking a chance or two.

I have advocated for years that the best selectors should pick the junior sides. Most intelligent watchers of the game can pick 20 national team players without too much effort. Ideal selectors are special people. They bring to the table an instinct for the job which is independent of the number of internationals they have played.

After all, if it were all down only to scores and stats, a computer would do the job just as well. I have no idea how the current committee will function, but the five-man team should not be dismissed out of hand merely because they haven’t played 100 Tests.

Vasu Paranjpe who didn’t play a Test would have made a wonderful selector. In fact, off the top of my head, I can think of many without Test experience who would have. From Mumbai, Raj Singh Dungarpur, Kailash Gattani, Makarand Waingankar, from Delhi Akash Lal, from Kolkata Karthik Bose, from Chennai A.G. Ramsingh, V. Ramnarayan, Abdul Jabbar and from Karnataka V.S. Vijaykumar, Sanjay Desai. Dungarpur and Lal were National selectors in the old days. The list is by no means exhaustive.

Temperament matters

It has often been argued that only someone who has played a bunch of Tests can understand the off-field pressures a young debutant may be subjected to. Hence the call for those who have experienced that. But a good selector will take temperament into account too.

Some of the heaviest scorers and highest wicket takers in the national championship have not played for India; clearly the selection committee has worked out that runs and wickets alone are not enough.

The question of hierarchy, however, is a valid one. At least two recent selectors, Mohinder Amarnath and Sandip Patil, respected internationals both, have admitted that dealing with the senior players with more Tests than they played is no picnic.

Within a committee too, if there is a big gap in experience or popular stature, those who may have better ideas but fewer Tests have been forced to go with the flow. Lala Amarnath, for example, was known to browbeat the panel.

I remember a respected former player, when he was manager of the national side being asked, “How many Tests have you played?” in a nasty sort of way. This is the hierarchy of numbers.

If M.S.K. Prasad (Chairman), Sarandeep Singh, Devang Gandhi, Gagan Khoda and Jatin Paranjpe bring to their job a professionalism, integrity and an instinct for the right pick, they would have rendered irrelevant numbers pertaining to their international experience. All this is, of course, assuming the Supreme Court endorses the BCCI’s stand.

There will be criticism — that is part of the job description of a selector. But if the BCCI is throwing its net wider to include those with the skill, but without the record, then there’s a hint for the selectors here. Sometimes you must take a punt on perceived skill regardless of record.

Monday, 26 September 2016

On the right to photocopy

S Sivakumar and L P Lukose in The Hindu


The DU photocopy judgment is a victory for access to education. But is it successful in balancing the competing interests of the academic community and the copyright holders?

On September 16, the Delhi High Court dismissed the copyright infringement petition filed by three international publishers against a photocopy shop located in the Delhi University premises (The Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of the University of Oxford v. Rameshwari Photocopy Services). The court ruled that making course packs for suggested reading for students by photocopying portions of various prescribed reference books does not violate the copyright of the publishers.

Right to reproduction

Section 14 of the Copyright Act, 1957, grants a bundle of exclusive rights such as the right to reproduction on copyright owners for commercial exploitation of the work. Making photocopies amounts to reproduction. Photocopies made in violation of Section 14 thus constitute infringement unless it is listed under Section 52 as an act not constituting infringement. The judgment holds that if any provision of the Act permits any person other than the owner to reproduce any work or substantial part thereof, such reproduction will not amount to infringement (Para 27).

The Copyright Act, to prevent stagnation of the growth of creativity, seeks to maintain a balance between the competing interests of the copyright owners on the one hand and the interests of the public to have access to works on the other. Copyright’s basic rationale is that there should be promotion of creativity through sufficient protection; and at the same time it also caters for dissemination of knowledge and access to copyright material through the doctrine of fair dealing. This doctrine, which is essential for research and academic purposes, is an exception to copyright holders’ exclusive rights. The Indian copyright law uses the term ‘fair deal’ (where listed purposes are statutorily embedded) whereas the U.S.’s copyright law adopts ‘fair use’ (which is merely illustrative). As per Article 13 of the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement, these exceptions must confine to “special cases which do not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work and do not unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the right holder”. Since the term ‘fair dealing’ is not defined in the Act, the judiciary determines its scope on a case by case basis.

Fair dealing

Section 52(1)(i) of the Copyright Act treats as fair dealing “the reproduction of any work (i) by a teacher or a pupil in the course of instruction; or (ii) as part of the questions to be answered in an exam; or (iii) in answers to such question. Section 52(1)(j) uses terms such as “staff and students of an educational institution” whereas Section 52(1)(i) uses “teacher or a pupil in the course of instruction.” On analysing this difference, the judgment holds that “there is no reason to interpret Section 52 (1)(i) as providing for an individual teacher and an individual pupil.” The word ‘instruction’ is not defined in the Act. According to Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw, the words “in the course of instruction” would include “reproduction of any work while the process of imparting instruction by the teacher and receiving instruction by the pupil continues during the entire academic session... imparting and receiving of instruction is not limited to personal interface between teacher and pupil but is a process commencing from the teacher readying herself/himself for imparting instruction, setting syllabus, prescribing text books, readings and ensuring, whether by interface in classroom/tutorials or otherwise...” Hence it would be fair dealing if the students click photographs of each page of portions of the prescribed book.

Limitations

Copyright must increase and not impede the harvest of knowledge. When the judgment reads, “Copyright is to motivate the creative activity of authors in order to benefit the public”, what is left for the copyright owners? The judgment places no limitation on photocopy if the material is prescribed in the course of instruction. Copyright holders invest considerably in creating works. Can this be ignored while interpreting Section 52(1)(i) as a license for reproducing unlimitedly everything prescribed in the suggested reading? If the legislature had intended to give such a wide interpretation to the words “in the course of instruction”, why does it add, “as part of the questions to be answered in an exam or in answers to such question” which should also be covered automatically? If the suggested reading provides for the whole book, does Section 52(1)(i) permit reproduction of the whole book or only reasonable excerpts? The judgment has conveniently avoided any direct reference to this aspect. The Court Commissioner had reported that “8 books were found being photocopied cover to cover”. Was the court successful in balancing the competing interests of the academic community and the copyright holders? When the university is entitled to free photocopy of 3,000 pages every month(Para 4), can the possibility of commercial interest be overruled? In that context, does it comply with Article 13 of TRIPS? Is it justified to cover the private photocopy shop in the university premises within the expression “in the course of instruction”? Doesn’t the judgment provide blanket immunity to the university to meet the demands of all the students by purchasing a single book?

Undoubtedly, the judgment, which is a breakthrough in the Indian copyright jurisprudence, is a major victory to access to education in a developing country like India. It will certainly have a far-reaching impact in academic circles as well as on the copyright industry. When access to education itself is a challenge, none of the students can be expected to purchase expensive textbooks, especially when syllabi prescribe certain portions from various books. Universities are expected to cater to students’ reading requirement without prejudicing copyright holders’ legitimate economic interests. Are the Indian universities honestly utilising funds earmarked for libraries for that purpose? The students’ demands can be met reasonably by permitting reproduction of reasonable excerpts.

Sunday, 25 September 2016

If you can’t beat Jeremy Corbyn, you’d better try to learn from him

Andrew Rawnsley in The Guardian


Speaking shortly before the re-coronation of Jeremy Corbyn, one Labour MP gloomily remarked of Owen Smith’s failed challenge: “It was always a kamikaze mission.”

Oh no, it has turned out much more desperate than that for Labour’s parliamentarians. Back in July, when the challenge was launched off the back of a no-confidence vote by MPs and mass resignations from the frontbench, few of his colleagues thought Mr Smith could win. The purpose of the exercise, or so they calculated, was not to install a new leader but to take the shine off the incumbent. Mr Smith was designed, and in more than one sense, to be the anti-Momentum candidate. If Mr Corbyn could be run reasonably close, so backers of the challenge hoped, it would diminish the “mandate” that he and his supporters have spent the last 12 months brandishing in the face of Labour MPs.

When the result was announced from the conference stage in Liverpool, it was instantly clear that the reverse has happened. Jeremy Corbyn has not only been reanointed as leader, he won by a larger margin than last year, he won in all three segments of the selectorate and he won on a higher rate of participation. The challenge has not diminished him; it has swollen the size of his congregation. The immediate fear of Labour MPs is that this will now be self-reinforcing. Mr Corbyn will further consolidate his grip on the commanding heights of Labour if centre-left members who have stuck with the party despite all the ugliness of the past year are so demoralised by his victory that they give up and quit.

Examining the entrails of defeat, many who originally backed it now acknowledge that this was the wrong challenge at the wrong time with the wrong candidate. Mr Smith ended up as the anti-Corbyn standard bearer on the grounds that a relative unknown from the soft left – “a clean skin” – had the best chance of getting a hearing from Labour activists. His first handicap was that he spent the beginning of the campaign having to say who he was. He had barely started to introduce himself before a ruthlessly efficient effort by Team Corbyn had already defined him as a former employee of big pharma and a “Trojan horse” for Blairite revanchism. He largely positioned himself in the same ideological zone as the incumbent in the belief that this would be the best way to appeal to Corbynistas. That strategy would have been no more effective had he also put on a fake beard. For this invited and received an understandable response from that constituency: why vote for an imitation when you can re-elect the real thing?

His claims that he would make a more credible and competent leader were undermined by his propensity to gaffe. One hundred and sixty-two of his parliamentary colleagues nominated Mr Smith. The more conventionally minded of us might think that, in a parliamentary democracy, it is quite important for a party leader to command the confidence of his MPs. Yet for those to whom Mr Corbyn is an appealing figure, it is one of his virtues that his parliamentary party are so hostile to him. Being the MPs’ candidate was not an asset for the challenger – it was massive liability. I have talked to a lot of Labour MPs who spent time canvassing members. They universally report that many activists blamed the party’s predicament and Mr Corbyn’s abysmal personal poll ratings not on the leader, but on the mutinous behaviour of Labour parliamentarians. The depiction of the challenge as a “coup” and the framing of the contest as Members v MPs, Grassroots v Westminster was toxic.

So Labour is back to where it was at the beginning of the summer, with a vast chasm between a leader with a mandate from the members and MPs claiming a rival mandate from their voters. With this difference. Those divisions are now more starkly exposed, more deeply entrenched and more poisonously bitter. One MP speaks about “taking bodyguards” to protect him at the conference. Another expresses genuine fear that fist fights – or worse – will break out in Liverpool.

If there can’t be a genuine peace between the two sides, could there at least be some form of truce? In his victory speech, a much crisper and more polished performance than 12 months ago, Mr Corbyn made magnanimous-sounding noises about wiping the slate clean. His campaign manager and shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, tells us that the party can move on from the venom that has flowed over the summer. “What is said on tour, stays on tour.” Even some of Mr Corbyn’s most implacable critics know that it would sound churlish to snipe this weekend and have largely fallen silent for the moment.

Beneath the surface, though, it is already evident that the party is as riven as ever. There will now be a struggle for control of the party machinery at both national and local levels. There is also the question, of importance to the country as well as to the Labour party, of whether it can become at least semi-functional as an opposition to the Tories in parliament. I can find some MPs willing to unresign and return to take on a frontbench role. Some will do so for fear of retribution in their constituencies or for careerist reasons. Some argue that the parliamentary party now has to make at least a show of being co-operative or the membership will carry on blaming the MPs, rather than the leader, when things go wrong. One of this tendency says: “We have to stop being an excuse for his failings.”

Others are prepared to return to the frontbench on the grounds that it is their duty to be a voice for the 9 million people who voted Labour at the last election and to provide an opposition to the Tories. Yet many say they will only do so if the parliamentary party is allowed to elect at least some of the frontbench. That would give them a way of returning on their terms and with at least some shreds of dignity. Mr Corbyn’s circle sound extremely resistant to that. From their point of view, they have good reasons not to accept the demand. They don’t see why he should agree to elections that would surround him with hostiles in his top team.

Nor do they see why he should concede to the demands of the parliamentary party when he has just seen off its attempt to unseat him. The general emollience of his victory speech had a streak of menace when he warned Labour MPs “to respect the democratic choice that has been made”.

With or without shadow cabinet elections, a lot of senior Labour figures will not serve in his team anyway. They say they cannot bite their tongues for long when, as they see it, the Labour party they love is being destroyed. They ask how it is possible to sit on Mr Corbyn’s frontbench when 172 of them have publicly declared him unfit to be leader of the opposition.

One thing they will now have time to ponder on is why their advice was rejected by the party. It might be convenient for moderate Labour MPs to blame the failure of the challenge entirely on the flaws of the challenger, but it would also be wrong. What the last three months have exposed again are fundamental weaknesses on the centre-left. Labour MPs often express dismay at Mr Corbyn’s claims to be building a “social movement” superior to his parliamentary party. They mock it as the politics of protest and a betrayal of Labour’s founding purpose, set out in Clause I of the party constitution, to aim for power. The former frontbencher Tristram Hunt wittily despairs that his party is becoming “the political wing of the Stop the War coalition”. They are right to say that there is a big difference between rousing rallies of the already converted and the harder challenge of moving enough of the wider population into your column to win a general election.

Sound as that analysis might be, you can see why Team Corbyn are not receptive to lectures about electability from critics who can’t win – can’t get anywhere near winning – an election in the Labour party. Comprehensively out-organised by Team Corbyn and their union backers in last year’s contest, the anti-Corbynites vowed to do much better this time. They have developed some infrastructure in the form of the groups Labour Tomorrow and Saving Labour. The latter claims to have signed up 120,000 new members. But the result speaks for itself. Momentum out-recruited and out-organised them. Labour has now become the largest political party in western Europe. That may say nothing about its capacity to win a general election under its current leadership, but it does say something.

Love him or loathe him, Mr Corbyn – or what he represents – is capable of attracting and enthusing support. If they are ever to get their party back, his opponents will have to do the same. And they will have to offer a more enticing prospectus than begging people to join Labour to save the party from itself. They have again failed to beat Jeremy Corbyn. Perhaps the best thing Labour moderates could do now, strange as this may seem, is to try to learn from him.