[Fsfe-ie] Proinsias De Rossa's swpat letter in today's Irish Times

[Rory McCann]

On Sat, 12 Jun 2004, Justin Mason wrote:
> David Golden writes:
> > I assume people saw his letter re software patents?
> > Comments & Letters, p15
> nope, I'm in the US, and the Letters page is subscriber-only content.
> any chance of the text? ;)

Here it is hand typed, so any spelling errors are my own:

Madam - The recent decision by EU industry ministers under the
chairmanship of the Tanaiste, Mary Harney, to reject nearly all of the
European Parliament's amendments to the controversial software patents
draft directive proposed by the Commission in 2002 is deeply regrettable.

On May 17th-18th the EU's Competitiveness Council caved in to intensive
industry lobbying and turned down 99 of the 120 amendments tabled by the
European Parliament last September.

It was deeply disappointing, but not surprising, that the Irish Government
did not vote against this move, like the Spanish, or abstain like the
Italian, Austrian and Belgium governments.

The parliament's vote last year was very clear - against the patenting of
software /per se/ but for strict interpretations and criteria for genuine
inventions.

Thankfully, the decision by the Tanaiste and the industry ministers is
not the final word. The new European Parliament will return tho this issue
in the autumn.

Yours, etc.

PROINSIAS DE ROSSA,
MEP Vice-President,
Socialist Group,
European Parliament.


He probably thought that it would get printed before the election, ah
well...


<rory>