Somebody on politics.ie posted the following response to an email he sent to
Gay Mitchell:
--
Thank you for your email. I have recently been to a debate on the directive
and met an Irish group, a cross-section of interested parties some very
small operators included, and they all come down on the "common position",
ie the agreed position of the Council of Ministers more or less. There are
hundreds of amendments down at Parliament level and I am taking advice on
these. I am taking advice on your concerns and will revert to you. Kind
regards, Gay Mitchell.
--
The Irish group he mentions is almost certainly the delegation organised by
IBEC that was mentioned in the Irish Times recently. Good lobbying on their
part to portray themselves as "a cross-section of interested parties". In
the Irish Times article they were also careful to mention that one of the
companies represented only had six employees. As another poster on
politics.ie suggested, these six are probably all patent lawyers :)
I think we should try to find out the composition of this delegation, as I
think it's likely their representations will carry a lot of weight with
Irish MEPs.
Ryan