Deadline likely to be missed on European patent
There was no agreement on the issue of establishing a European Community patent at the Internal Market Council on 26 November, meaning the deadline set for its establishment, the end of 2001, is likely to be missed. Disagreement remains among Member States over the number of languages that the proposed pan-European patent should be translated into, the roles of national patent offices and the jurisdictional arrangements. 'I am bitterly disappointed that, despite the sterling efforts of the Belgian Presidency, it was not possible for the Council to agree today on the Community patent,' said Internal Market Commissioner, Frits Bolkestein. He added that Ministers had 'once again demonstrated their inflexibility' and had not given the proposal a long term analysis. Given the lack of progress, Commissioner Bolkestein recommended that that the issue of the Community patent should be added to the agenda of the forthcoming Laeken European Council. While a Commission official told CORDIS News that this move has not been decided definitely, the source did say that discussions will take place in COREPER (Committee of Permanent Representatives) to see what progress can be made before the Council takes place. The draft regulation on the European Community patent was originally tabled by the Commission in July 2000 and summits at Lisbon and Feira during that year set the end of 2001 as the time when the patent should be available. It was seen as a means of making patents more affordable, more common and more enforceable, thereby giving concrete support to EU R&D (research and development) efforts and to SMEs (small and medium sized enterprises). Advances in both research and competitiveness were expected as a result. However, without a breakthrough in the logjam, this will all be lost, according to Commissioner Bolkestein. 'The failure to agree increases the risk that the whole Lisbon agenda to increase Europe's competitive position may be regarded as simply declaratory politics,' he said. Specifically, the proposal to have the patent translated into only English, French and German split the Council, with several delegations for and several against. Those who are against would like to see all languages respected, those in favour point out that this will require translation into 19 languages following enlargement. Also divisive is the role of national patent offices. Some delegates wanted to see a decentralised role of issuing European patents with the role of the national office (and its resources) largely unaffected. Others want to see a situation more similar to that originally proposed by the European Commission, which sees a centralised issuing procedure and structure. With issues not even drawing a majority decision, the unanimous decision required appears unlikely during the Belgian Presidency. While this is bad news for European R&D and SMEs, some good news emerged from a statement by the UK's Chancellor on 27 November. He announced new tax incentives for large UK firms spending more on R&D. The measure is already in place for SMEs, although they benefited too from new measures, which should introduce wider availability of venture capital. The changes mean that investment in R&D will effectively be treated as capital investment. 'This is important because it sends a message that the Government is interested in investing in science and R&D, which means more training, better equipment is used, etc,' said Dr Peter Cotgreave of the 'Save British science society'.