Council Decision 2004-05-18 for Unlimited Patentability -- What Next?

--> Council 2004-05-18, Reversal

Faced with an unconstructive counter-proposal which goes even further away from the Parliament's position than the previous one, addresses none of the Parliaments concerns and slams shut doors of possible compromise that were previously open, the European Parliament will have little other option than to say No in one way or another. If it choses to simply reaffirm its previous position in another reading, this would ultimately lead to a conciliation procedure. Unless enough pressure is built at the national level to make ministers stop blindly trusting their patent office administrators, the conciliation procedure also offers little guarantee of producing a workable compromise.

There will of course be more pressure on the European Parliament from all sides. The patent departments of the large corporations will be sending even more fully paid lobbyists than before. In previous campaigns for the gene patent directive many millions were spent by the patent lobby. A similar attempt at pushing the Council paper through the Parliament by all means is to be expected.

Yet the critics of software patentability have also grown stronger. The message has reached the top level of ministerial bureaucracy in many countries and with each round of negotiations in the Council more ice melts away. More ministerial officials than ever before have realised that the emperor is naked. This is one of the reasons why the patent administrators in the Council's backrooms have opted for an all-or-nothing approach.