Commentary on the Licensing Act 1662

Legislation prohibiting the publication of any literary work without prior licence.
Drawing upon both the Star Chamber Decree 1637 (uk_1637) and the Acts Regulating Printing during the Interregnum (see: uk_1643 and associated documents), the Licensing Act set out a comprehensive set of provisions concerning both the licensing of the press and the regulation and management of the book trade. In addition, it confirmed the rights of those holding printing privileges (or patents) granted in accordance with the royal prerogative (see for example: Day's privilege for The Cosmographical Glass (uk_1559b)) as well as those who had registered works with the Stationers' Company (uk_1557). It also introduced the first legal library deposit requirement. In force between 1662 and 1679, and then again between 1685 and 1695, the Act represents the last occasion on which the censorship of the press was formally and strategically linked to the protection of the economic interests of the Stationers' Company. Its lapse led the Stationers' Company to lobby parliament for renewed protection, ultimately resulting in the passing of the Statute of Anne 1710 (uk_1710).

Commentary on the Calico Printers' Act 1787

Legislation conferred exclusive rights lasting two months on those first printing 'new and original' patterns on linens, cottons, calicoes and muslins.
The commentary describes the background to the Act, the challenge which the Northern cotton and printing industry presented to those printing fashionable cottons and calicoes in London, as well as the significance of the cotton industry to the British economy in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Against this backdrop, the commentary also explores why it was that the protection provided by the legislature was limited to two months only, by comparison with the more generous copyright terms provided by the Statute of Anne 1710 (uk_1710) and the Engravers' Acts (uk_1735; uk_1766; uk_1777).

Commentary on International Copyright Act 1852

Legislation introducing the concept of translation rights within British copyright law. The document contains the following associated material: Hansard: 119 (1852): 498-502 (uk_1852a); 121 (1852): 4 (uk_1852b); Anglo-French Copyright Treaty (uk_1851).
Introduced to implement the obligations of the Anglo-French Copyright Convention, agreed in November 1851, this Act provided that the British monarch could, by Order in Council, provide foreign authors with the right to prevent the reproduction and performance of their literary and dramatic works in translation. The Act also introduces the first statutorily defined permitted acts within the UK, and is indicative of the increasing influence that international standards and obligations began to exert upon the content and substance of domestic copyright law.
The commentary locates the Act within the context of the two previous International Copyright Acts (see: uk_1838; uk_1844) and the Anglo-French Convention, highlighting the selective manner in which the British legislature implemented its obligations under the 1851 Convention, in particular in drawing a distinction between the reproduction of political and non-political material, as well as the difficulty that foreign authors experienced in complying with the provisions of the legislation.

Beyond the ‘Tomlinson Trap’: Analysing the Effectiveness of Section 1 of the Compensation Act 2006

One of the intentions underpinning section 1 of the Compensation Act 2006 was to provide reassurance to individual volunteers, and voluntary organisations, involved in what the provision called ‘desirable activities’ and including sport. The perception was that such volunteers, motivated by an apprehension about their increased vulnerability to negligence liability, and as driven by a fear of a wider societal compensation culture, were engaging excessively in risk-averse behaviour to the detriment of such socially desirable activities. Academic commentary on section 1 of the Compensation Act 2006 has largely regarded the provision as unnecessary and doing little more than restating existing common law practice. This article argues otherwise and, on critically reviewing the emerging jurisprudence, posits the alternative view that section 1, in practice, affords an enhanced level of protection and safeguarding for individuals undertaking functions in connection with a desirable activity. Nonetheless, the occasionally idiosyncratic judicial interpretation given to term ‘desirable activity’, potentially compounded by recent enactment of the Social Action, Responsibility and Heroism Act 2015, remains problematic. Two points of interest will be used to inform this debate. First, an analysis of the then House of Lords’ decision in Tomlinson and its celebrated ‘balancing exercise’ when assessing reasonableness in the context of negligence liability. Second, a fuller analysis of the application of section 1 in the specific context of negligence actions relating to the coaching of sport where it is argued that the, albeit limited, jurisprudence might support the practical utility of a heightened evidential threshold of gross negligence.