Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-07-05-Speech-2-017"
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"en.20050705.6.2-017"2
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".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, this debate is indeed of huge importance because the stakes are extremely high. Intellectual freedom, technological innovation and Europe’s economic competitiveness are all in jeopardy, as scientists, professors, the student community, a number of organisations and small and medium-sized enterprises have all correctly pointed out.
The common position adopted by the Council on 7 March of this year is as unacceptable as the proposal for a directive tabled on 20 February 2002. Parliament had its say on the matter on 24 September 2004, yet the Council completely disregarded its opinion, and that is unacceptable.
As we said at the time, it is wrong to award patents to ideas, to knowledge and – who knows where it will end – to life itself. Accordingly, as we proposed at the time as regards the proposal for a directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions, we advocate that the Council common position be rejected. This is the most appropriate course of action at this time, and the only one that will prevent innovation and knowledge from following a very dangerous path.
As we know, the current copyright system already provides substantial protection for authors of software, giving them control over how their work is used. Yet it is wrong to jeopardise the idea that any person who knows how to do so should be able to sit at a computer and write the software that he or she wants to, or that businesses should be able to develop specific software to cater for their needs.
To concentrate the right to create software in the hands of the few would lead to dangerous restrictions. As we have seen, software has contributed towards the development of economies and has made it possible to make many tasks automatic and simplified at relatively low cost. Under a legal framework in which software is governed by patents this would not be possible.
A business or a person at home would be forced to hire a team of specialist lawyers before designing new software to check whether the idea might infringe a patent. This is therefore very dangerous ground. Unlike normal patents, which protect an invention, software patents actually encourage the improper use of ideas. In other words, software patents are tantamount to an attack on intellectual freedom and on European industry’s ability to create and develop new ideas.
What this boils down to is that software patents are simply legal mechanisms for concentrating the development of knowledge and the capacity for innovation into the hands of large multinational corporations such as Microsoft and others. Individuals and micro- and small and medium-sized enterprises would not have the wherewithal to compete in the courtroom with large companies over an abstract idea.
It is therefore crucial that we reject this Council position. As far as our Group is concerned, there is no need for any directive in this area, but were such a directive to exist, let us ensure at least that people’s rights to create innovative ideas and their intellectual freedom are safeguarded, and we trust that the proposals for amendments to which we put our name will be adopted."@en1
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