December 16, 2015 – The draft law for a Digital Republic presented on Wednesday December 9 by the Secretary of State for Digital Affairs, Axelle Lemaire, is the result of an ambitious citizen co-writing process.

As early as October 2014, a major national consultation was launched by the Prime Minister. More than 4,000 contributions from businesses, government agencies and individuals were received and summarized by the National Digital Council, which submitted its conclusions to the Government on June 18, 2015. A draft text was then drawn up by the Government and submitted to an online public consultation, which resulted in over 8,500 contributions and almost 150,000 votes.

This participatory approach is to be applauded: it is a reminder that digital technology is a powerful tool for thinking differently about today’s major social issues, which also enables us to rethink the way we do politics.

This digital bill is part of a rapidly changing European environment.

Today, Europe seems to be lagging behind in the digital revolution, struggling to create genuine “European champions” capable of competing with the American and Asian leaders in this sector. But the European regulatory framework required for this digital revolution is now at a major turning point.

Founding principles such as “net neutrality” and the “right to be forgotten” are now enshrined in European law, or are about to be.

The European regulation on personal data protection, presented by the European Commission in 2012, is about to be adopted: it will enable major advances for fundamental rights in this new digital universe.

Today, Europe is the optimal level for encouraging and overseeing these new modes of production, consumption and creation, because digital technology knows no borders. Faced with the power of start-ups that have become multinationals such as Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple – the famous “GAFA” – only the European Union has the critical mass to act as the mediator of an open Internet that respects individual rights. Simply legislating at national level would not make sense, and would risk putting French companies at a disadvantage compared to their European competitors: the ultimate horizon for effective and ambitious digital regulation must be European.

The new European Commission has understood this: it has made digital one of its priorities and presented a new digital strategy on May 6, 2015.

The draft law presented by the Government should help to reinforce this European momentum, not only by stimulating public debate on these issues, but also by acting as a precursor, drawing up the broad outlines that could serve as a basis for future European regulations, in the same way that the 1978 CNIL law inspired the main principles of the 1995 directive on the protection of personal data.

Many of the issues addressed by the bill are directly or indirectly linked to European law. In the interests of efficiency and legal certainty, it is therefore crucial that the provisions proposed in this bill are properly coordinated with those in force – or to come – at European level.

The government is fully aware of this. As early as September, the Secretary of State informed the two European Commissioners responsible for the digital sector by letter of the main provisions of the text submitted for consultation, before travelling to Brussels to present, among other things, the main thrust of the bill to the European Commission and the European Parliament (the Government also notified the European Commission of these measures on November 10: a so-called standstill period is open for three months – possibly extendable by four months, during which the notified measures cannot be adopted).

It is for this very reason that the European Affairs Committee has decided to comment on this bill, in application of article 151-1-1 of the National Assembly’s rules of procedure.