[Fsfe-ie] Parties on swpat

[Alex Macfie]

On Tue, 2004-08-24 at 15:09, Justin Mason wrote:

> There does seem to be a gulf, alright.  The Fianna Fail MEPs have been
> anti-swpat (a little bit to my surprise ;).

Indeed, natural parties of government tend to take a pro-swpat stance,
probably because of a "trust the civil service" culture. This is true
regardless of ideological outlook -- the Swedish Social Democrats and
the UK Conservatives (who still think of themselves as a natural party
of gvt even if it's now questionable whether they really are) are as
different as can be ideologically, but both are firmly pro-swpat.

Possibly reasons for FF's stance in the European Parliament:
-- Its legal affairs spokesman Brian Crowley seems to have a clue.
-- Its allies in the European Parliament: yes, conservative, but not in
the Anglo-Saxon mould, instead populist and even anti-American. AIUI FF
itself comes from that tradition.
-- The Irish voting system means you can't afford to alienate your
voters.

> OTOH, Gay Mitchell (Fine Gael) informed a voter last June that he was
> pro-swpat, despite the FG party position having changed to anti:
> 
>   - Mitchell: http://www.eire.com/blogarchives/000138.html
> 
>   - FG: http://4c.ucc.ie/~cbosch/dscf1032.jpg
>         http://4c.ucc.ie/~cbosch/dscf1033.jpg
> 

The documents above may represent Avril Doyle's policy more than
official FG policy. It's good, tho', if people within FG actually think
it *is* their policy.

My hunch is that FG doesn't actually have a formal policy on software
patents (and nor does FF). Of course having one doesn't mean that the
MEPs would actually follow it --- look at the British LibDems.

Alex
> 
> 
> -- 
> Alex Macfie, Taipei, Taiwan ROC              email <alex at cgce.net>
> Tel: +886 955 857477                        <http://www.cgce.net/>
> STOP SOFTWARE PATENTS IN EUROPE           <http://swpat.ffii.org/>
-- 
Alex Macfie, Taipei, Taiwan ROC              email <alex at cgce.net>
Tel: +886 955 857477                        <http://www.cgce.net/>
STOP SOFTWARE PATENTS IN EUROPE           <http://swpat.ffii.org/>