Data (Use and Access) Act receives Royal Assent after AI copyright dispute

The Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 received Royal Assent on 19 June 2025. Much of the Act concerns data sharing and digital verification, but its passage was dominated by a dispute over AI and copyright.

In the House of Lords, Baroness Kidron led amendments that would have required AI developers to be transparent about the copyright works used to train their models. The Commons repeatedly rejected them, and the Bill passed back and forth between the Houses over several weeks. On 11 June 2025 the Lords agreed to the government's revised amendments and the Bill completed its passage without the transparency obligations.

Instead, sections 135 to 137 require the Secretary of State to publish, within nine months of the Act being passed, an economic impact assessment of the options in the copyright and AI consultation and a report on the use of copyright works in the development of AI systems. The report must cover technical measures and standards, transparency by developers, licensing and enforcement, including the effect on individuals and small businesses. A progress statement was due within six months.

Why it matters: the Act does not change copyright law, and there is still no statutory duty on AI developers to disclose training material. It did fix a deadline for the government to set out its thinking, which gives authors and publishers a clear point at which the policy debate will resume.

Sources: legislation.gov.uk: Data (Use and Access) Act 2025, section 136; Hogan Lovells: UK Data (Use and Access) Bill, copyright clauses finally agreed.