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RE:[LUG] EU Vote June 12th - who to vote for



Just received 2 replies to the emails I sent to our local EMPs.
Comment anyone?

Firstly Glyn Ford (Labour) which offers some hope.

Dear Keith,
Thank you for sharing your views with me and let me explain what my position is.
I, along with the Parliament, voted for limits to the patenting of computer-implemented inventions. The Member States, through the Council of Ministers, have chosen to ignore Parliament's views, which has disappointed us greatly and we are now preparing for some very tough negotiations with them.
However, fortunately the Council of Ministers and the Commission cannot ignore our views as democratically elected Members of the European Parliament. I can assure you that the Parliament will defend its position and there will be no final law without the agreement of the Parliament. If both the Council of Ministers and the European Commission refuse to reinsert Parliament's amendments, there will be no Directive. Our power on this piece of legislation is very strong: we can modify it or block it if we choose to do so.
The position of the Labour MEPs remains unchanged and in the negotiations we will defend Parliament's position:
· We are not in favour of patenting of software as in the US.
· Europe needs a uniform legal approach to stop the drifting towards extending patentability to inventions, which would not have been traditionally allowed, and to stop patentability of pure business methods, algorithms or mathematical methods.
· Software products as such, must not be patented.
· Opensource software must be allowed to flourish and the Commission must ensure that this Directive does not have any adverse effect on opensource software and small software developers.
· Patents and the threat of litigation must not be used as an anti-competitive weapon to squeeze out small companies.
I hope this clarifies the situation.
Yours sincerely,
Glyn Ford
Glyn Ford MEP
Tel. +32 2 284 7518/6540
Fax: +32 2 284 9518
www.glynford.com <http://www.glynford.com>

Secondly Graham Watson (Liberal) which merely explains the present situation.

Dear Mr Abrahm,

Thank you for your email regarding software patents.  The proposal for a
Directive on patentability of computer-implemented inventions is currently
being examined by Council at first reading.  The co-decision legislative
procedure requires that if the Council decides not accept our amendments,
the proposal has to come back to the European Parliament.  This means that
the Directive  was not adopted on the 17th or 18th May, and will probably
come back to the Parliament for second reading in the Autumn.

Even then, if the Parliament and Council fail to agree after a second
reading, we will then look at the proposal again, together with the
Commission, in a special “Conciliation Committee”.  Rest assured that when
proposals are subject to the Co-Decision procedure it is not possible for
governments of the Member States to disregard the view of the European
Parliament.

I would advise you, therefore, to get in contact with MEPs when this
proposal comes back to the European Parliament for second reading.

Yours sincerely,

Graham Watson MEP
Leader of the Liberal Democrat and
Reform Party in the European Parliament



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