Unitary Patent: discussions postponed in Parliament, let's stay involved!

Despite what was said in July, the issue of the Unitary Patent was not discussed by members of the legal affairs (JURI) Committee of the European Parliament in its September meeting. The next Committee meeting will take place on October 10th and 11th, 2012. Until then, mobilisation needs to continue, especially since new documents just underlined the importance of the improvements wanted by April.

The content of the regulation is currently still under discussion. Although an agreement seemed to have been reached, the Heads of State Summit demanded that some essential articles- which offered safeguards, however insufficient, on the issue of patentability - be withdrawn from the text. The European Parliament opposed these demands, and April called for the improvement of the draft to guarantee that the scope of patentability be defined by the European Parliament and that the threat of software patents be once and for all overridden in Europe.

New publications internal to the European Parliament strengthen this position: a note from the legal department of the European Parliament, dated July 9th 2012, emphasizes that the request of the European Summit to delete articles which are implementing a minimal control on the future European patent system is illegal with regards to the treaties, and would not allow it anymore to reach an appropriate balance of rights.

If the recovery of these articles is a first step, however it is necessary to go further: the Parliament must be in a position to legislate fully upon what is patentable and what is not, instead of leaving these matters to the jurisprudence of an international law organization without any democratic control.

April calls for going on with mobilisation and asks/incites citizens to contact MEPs and firms to support the resolution in order to amend the bill to ensure respect of rights and innovation in Europe, far from dangers like software patents.