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6.45 p.m.

The Earl of Northesk: My Lords, I join other noble Lords in expressing gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Ellesmere, and his committee. The report before us today summarises the information society in all its myriad aspects in a clear, intelligible way. To any who feel themselves stumbling in the dark of IT's terminology, to anyone who has an interest in how IT will shape our future, the report serves as an excellent introductory analysis.

IT is of course an immense subject. The perception that it will be an agent for radical and extreme change permeates the whole report. Thus, in paragraph 1.6 the report says:

"As the Bangemann Report said 'this revolution adds huge new capacities to human intelligence and constitutes a resource which changes the way we work together and the way we live together'. The potential technological, economic, and social upheavals resulting from the information revolution could be of the same order of magnitude as those arising from the shift away from an agricultural to an industrial economy".

Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Porter, referred to that. It is a useful analogy. The industrial revolution may have created some troubles and difficulties, but there is no denying that we as a nation benefited from it enormously. There is merit in assessing how and why as a guide to how we should proceed with IT. It seems to me--and I am no historian--that one of the most important reasons was that, in the main, we were prepared to embrace the new technology. In effect, governance, commerce, and society itself could see the potential benefits and were, to a greater or lesser extent, in step with the technological advances in both thought and deed.

I am less certain that this is so as the information revolution gathers pace. Yes, there is adoption of IT on a grand scale and in all kinds of areas, but our capacity to adapt to it seems a much more nebulous affair. The evidence provided to the committee by the University of Leeds puts its finger, so far as I am concerned, on that particular pulse in calling for,

"computer literacy skills to be replaced by 'information literacy'",

explaining this requirement thus in paragraph 4.88:

"Without it being seriously addressed and adequately resourced, the users of the Information Superhighway will be as disenfranchised as if they had been set free in a library without ever having been taught to read and write".

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The credibility gap, if I can call it that, between adoption of the technology and adaptation to it is as wide as that. In much the same vein, the British Library states in paragraph 4.209:

"We have everything to play for, but we have to find ways of getting all parts of the community thinking about how it is going to affect their particular interests and lives";

while the Technology Foresight ITEC Panel at paragraph 4.213:

"We think it is going to be quite disruptive, quite profound and we ought to be master of it and a leader in its exploitation not a rather unwilling laggard who just has it done to us".

In that regard, I am frequently struck by how many of your Lordships and how many Members of another place seem to be, if not intimidated by, diffident towards the new technology. Indeed, as the report mentions,

"The Westminster Parliament has not been an 'early adopter' of Internet technology".

We should not be too surprised by that. It is exceedingly difficult to unlearn, as it were, the habits of lifetimes spent working with paper-based institutions and acquire those necessary for working with ones based on information technology. It requires an entirely different mind-set from that with which most of us grew up and to which most of us are used.

At the moment we live and work with systems that rely upon compartmentalisation and specialisation. These are not readily adaptable to IT, nor indeed IT to them. This goes to the very heart of one of the most consistent threads within the report, much emphasised by my noble friend Lord Selborne; namely, that what is required above all else is a co-ordinated approach. Thus:

"What is needed now is a concerted effort to pull together all the current UK initiatives, many of which are excellent, into a coherent whole".

In the light of that, I share the disappointment of other noble Lords, even disquiet, that the Government chose to reject the committee's recommendation for a UK information society task force with the specific remit that:

"One of its first jobs should be to draw up a policy document setting out its advice to the Government for a UK agenda for action, involving both the private and the public sector".

Superficially at least, there is some logic in the reasoning underlying that decision, as,

"it would suggest a top-down culture to the Information Society".

However, in the words of the report,

"Since the development of the Information Society should be a national objective, the Task Force should represent the full diversity of interests, expertise and opinions across society as a whole".

I trust that I do not misrepresent the committee if I say that that vision does not strike me as being intended to be in any way top-driven. More importantly, there is an urgent requirement for the visionary lead and impetus that an ISTF (if noble Lords will forgive the acronym) would provide.

That said, I do not doubt the validity of the Government's perception that their existing IT initiatives,

"provide a useful diversity of input, and combine to form a coherent and balanced approach to the development and implementation of issues relevant to the development of the Information Society".

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However, that approach is re-active rather than pro-active. Our journey through the information revolution will be no more than an aimless magical mystery tour if we simply rely on what we meet on the way to determine our course and if we do not afford ourselves achievable destinations within a predetermined time frame.

Of course I acknowledge the publication this month of government.direct. However, in the words of my right honourable friend Roger Freeman,

"The purpose of this Green Paper is to explain the Government's vision of what is possible, and to start a debate".

I also note that apart from,

"a number of pilot schemes in partnership with industry ... it is likely to be a year or 18 months before ... implementation of the strategy".

By inference, the proposals within the Green Paper again envisage a re-active rather than pro-active involvement with IT.

This particular dilemma of IT is nowhere more apparent than in its regulatory and legislative context. The blurring of the boundaries between the broadcasting, telecommunications and information services industries is a well-recognised phenomenon of IT, and one that should serve as a catalyst for regulatory convergence in these areas. However, as the report indicates,

"In 1994 the Government said that 'it ... would ... be premature at present to promote change in the regulatory structures, in the absence of much more concrete information about how convergence will occur.' In the meantime, the Government has continued to legislate separately for the rapidly converging industries concerned".

The greater part of the evidence submitted to the committee on this subject reveals that there is an overwhelming sentiment supporting the contention that such a re-active approach is seriously undermining the capacity of the UK to keep up with developments in IT, let alone take full advantage of them.

So far as concerns the legislative context, I have had occasion in the past to cite a comment from Nicholas Negroponte. I make no apology for repeating it in this context:

"Most of the people, and particularly legislators, are fundamentally clueless about what is going on".

If policy formulation is to all intents and purposes re-active in character, this can only be reflected in our consideration of such policy and in its enactment into law. And, of course, that is further compounded by the diffidence/intimidation that so many parliamentarians appear to feel towards IT. The upshot is that, as legislators, we are simply playing "catch-up" with the new technology. Worryingly, that that is so is manifest in very many areas of our society. For example, it has been observed by police constable John Thackray of the South Yorkshire Police, one of the country's most experienced computer investigators, that:

"We are far behind our own criminals on these matters. We only catch them when they get complacent and keep using old technology and old methods. If they simply keep up with current technology, they are so far ahead they are safe".

That signifies the very real risks implicit in a re-active approach to IT.

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Finally, I offer what I believe to be the most intriguing piece of evidence submitted to the committee. Microsoft stated that,

"the big thing that kept people coming back was the ability to form on-line communities, to meet people in a common interest, whether it be travel to Alaska or gardening or political debate".

It may well be that the concept of the "cyber society", even the "corporate nation", are the stuff of science fiction. However, the juxtaposition of a deep disaffection with our existing political and governmental processes and the possibilities inherent in IT--especially the fact that it is no respecter of geographical boundaries--means that that is something that could very well happen. This is the order of magnitude of

"the potential technological, economic, and social upheavals"

to which the report refers.

In evidence to the committee, Microsoft,

"stressed the need for the government to think about the future, rather than thinking 'about the business as if it were yesterday'".

What is required is a more visionary and forward- looking approach.

Nor should we close our minds to the fact that it is the responsibility of us all, of the whole of society and not just government, to make our contributions in this area. We all need to adapt to as well as adopt the new technology if we are to establish the necessary foresight and understanding not only to enable us to get the best out of IT but also to shape it for the benefit of all, and if we are not to be "a rather unwilling laggard who just has it done to us".

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