Glasgow pub hit with £6,000 penalty for football copyright breach

The Merchants Quay Bar was hit with the £6,000 fine as Premier Leagueofficials crackdown on copyright infringement.

Use of foreign feeds undermines Premier League administrators’ deal with Sky Sports and BT Sport for coverage of live matches.

While individuals can use European digiboxes to watch the games, commercial premises must obtain the permission of the copyright holder, meaning the Premier League and its member clubs.

A judgment was made against the bar in the Court of Session after it was previously issued with an interim inderdict requiring it to stop broadcasting matches.

A Premier League spokesman said: “The courts granted the judgment following failure by the defendants to engage in the case, despite several attempts to contact the publican.”

The last 18 months has seen 31 “letters before action” sent to Scottish pubs.

In most cases the pubs complied with the requests and stopped broadcasting.

In five cases over the past 11 months, however, the Premier League took legal action.

The spokesman said of the latest case: “It’s a further example for publicans that copyright infringement will not be tolerated by the Premier League or the Scottish courts.

“We will continue to take action against suppliers of systems which allow pubs to breach our copyright, and pubs which do so like the Merchant’s Quay in Glasgow.

“This case follows action taken against several other Scottish pubs over the past two years and the Premier League will continue to take action against pubs north of the border if they make unauthorised foreign broadcasts of its matches.”