Well, Mr Daniel Hannan responded on Saturday, and what a horrible thing to find on my breakfast table it was. Unashamedly pro patents, he claims that the problems the anti-patent lobby state are exaggerated, that the US patent system does work and that there is no evidence of it harming small businesses. According to the Conservatives, a strong patent system is essential for small IT.
I was unaware that Conservative HQ was on another planet; if he can show me in 10% of small IT companies in favour of this legislation I would be amazed. I’ve been forced to put LaTeX to toner again, and send this response.
Well, Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne MEP has “replied” to my software patents letter. I don’t think she’ll mind if I quote her verbatim.
“Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne MEP acknowledges with thanks receipt of your letter of 8 April 2005 the contents of which have been noted”
I feel this response was well worth waiting 3 weeks for, and really gets to the heart of the matter. Oh, wait…
On arriving home today, the reply of Nirajan Deva was waiting in my inbox. Finally, a real reply from the Conservatives! Upon reading it, I wish they hadn’t bothered.
The position summary: They fully support the current bill, thought all the amendments by the parliament would make it unworkable, and they will all vote in support of it. The rest of the mail reiterates the standard garbage about how it will “not increase patentability” and “is needed for clarification”. I will be responding with a proper rebuttal at some point in the next few days, but until then, it seems the Conservative party in both the UK and EU is so out of touch with reality as to be entirely pointless.
Just when you thought the Conservatives couldn’t get any more irrelevant, Jame Elles responds telling me exactly the same as Danial Hannan. As expected, no reply from Mr Ashworth. Glad to know their system for more effective representation is working!
What exactly was the point in electing 3 South East MEPs from them again?
Well, less than an hour after my email was sent, Peter had replied with a full letter. Whether created there and then, pulled from a filing cabinet, or written previously and just stuck in the post, it’s impressive. I think I’ll have to review my policy of using dead trees as my primary communication with politicians.
His response is interesting, and is the most moderate I’ve seen. He (and the rest of his Labour colleges) is taking what seems on paper to be a sensible position.
- A US style software patenting system must not be created
- Software products as such should not be patentable
- Open source “must be allowed to flourish”
- Any patents granted should not be used just to squeeze out small companies
These are admirable goals, and if they are all achieved, I think it will mitigate most of my fears (and the fears of most non-extremist anti-patent developers).
The one thing that concerns me is a statement saying that Labour is supporting an effort to create a defence fund to protect UK companies against litigation from dominant players. Whilst it seems a sensible idea on the surface, it raises the spectre that the directive will be ambiguous enough to allow such litigation to proceed past initial hearings.
He closes by claiming he will be following the progress of the directive closely. We who are opposed to the current directive must ensure we keep putting our position in front of the politicians – else they may be won over by the far better funded pro-patent lobby.
