After the big discussion on Clause 10, things got much easier. There was a flurry of relatively quick clauses passed through, with six clauses agreed to in the space of a hour and 40 minutes - which, by the standards of this Bill, is very quick indeed. Of course, it was all leading up to the eagerly-anticipated Clause 17 (the one about changing copyright law without Parliament's approval). Let's power through these simple-looking clauses, and I'll leave Clause 17 to another day.

Clause 11 : Obligations to limit internet access. The major discussions were made in the previous clause, which was about preparations for this stage. There wasn't all that much discussion about the actual obligations. There was an amendment agreed to from the government, which added that technical measures cannot be taken without a resolution from both Houses, which is a very sensible point, as everyone ought to agree before Ofcom start cutting people's internet off.

Clause 11 passed - Amendment 177B agreed

Clause 12 : Code by OFCOM about obligations to limit internet access. No debate. No amendments. No problem.

Clause 12 passed - no amendments

Clause 13 : Contents of code about obligations to limit internet access. An important initial debate ensued about whether people would have technical measures imposed on them before or after an appeal is put forth. There has been a lot of debate about appeals against being wrongfully accused of illegal file-sharing. Various ideas have been bandied about, such as paying a refundable fee to deter "frivolous appeals". On this particular question, Lord Young of Norwood Green made it very clear that "the full appeals process should be completed before any technical measure is imposed". So that's alright, then.

Lord Clement-Jones brought up the point about public internet in universities, libraries and so on. Members from all sides - bar the government - agreed that this could be a problem, as it would be very difficult to monitor public systems like this. For example, Swindon had plans to make the town a wi-fi hot-spot, so how you could monitor the whole city is a cause for concern. The argument against, by Lord Young, is that bandwidth, especially in the case of Swindon, would make file-sharing unrealistic, which I agree with - I can get free wi-fi at McDonald's, but I'm not going to download torrents from there as it would take hours, and frankly I don't want to spend all day in McDonald's. The other point about policing it was addressed by saying that there are "reasonable steps" to stop people accessing certain sites and using P2P programs, though the government "do not pretend that such measures are 100 per cent effective and we do not require this". They just want to make sure that would-be infringers have to "make a conscious decision and some effort to continue to infringe".

Related to the appeals process, Lord Whitty returned to the point about how alleged infringers can defend themselves, as the current balance "is almost entirely on the side of the copyright holder". He insisted that this was a very important point, since "in the Swedish elections after the piracy case nearly a quarter of all voters under 25 voted for the Pirate Party. Their votes were completely wasted, but the mainstream parties had alienated those voters. There are bigger social and political issues involved in this than the Government are facing up to".

Clause 13 passed - no amendments

Clause 14 : Enforcement of obligations. The first question was concerned with the maximum penalty on ISPs to be £250,000, should they be guilty of allowing illegal stuff to be done on their watch. Several members around the chamber agreed that this is an enormous sum of money, and the argument that ISPs are mere conduits - and thus can't be responsible for the content that they serve, just like the Post Office can't be responsible for delivering illegal material - has already been debated. The Earl of Erroll warned that although it is a maximum, it will be "misused" (he tries to be as pessimistic as possible on the whole Bill). Lord Faulkner of Worcester insisted that the text of the Bill "makes it clear that this has to be both appropriate and proportionate to the contravention", so it is simply a maximum, and we have to trust Ofcom to do the right thing. Lord Clement-Jones slyly quipped that "we had his velvet glove when he talked of a graded response, but now we get the mailed fist of the £250,000 maximum penalty".

Clause 14 passed - no amendments

Clause 15 : Sharing of costs. This has been discussed at length already, with the consensus being that ISPs shouldn't shoulder legal costs that rights holders induce, such as the cost of sending letters to subscribers. The Earl of Erroll argued that if ISPs have an extra cost of sending letters to accused illegal file-sharers, eventually the costs will be shifted to subscribers. In his words, "we will see the monthly cost of internet service provision going up. That will be broadcast in bright lights to subscribers. If the Opposition hope to come to power, they do not want this happening on their watch". Lord Young responded that it's "not appropriate for the Government to dictate how any of the industry parties should cover their costs or to prohibit any particular route". Well, that answers that, then. Lord Howard of Rising was "not sure that we would have demonstrations in Trafalgar Square about this, with people being thrown into fountains, but who can tell?"

Clause 15 passed - Amendment 200A & 206A agreed

Clause 16 : Interpretation and consequential provision. There were a couple of quick questions, but nothing really major. It's just about interpretation of terms used in the Bill.

Clause 16 passed - no amendments