Barry Mahon wrote:
On Tue, 01 Mar 2005 11:00:13 +0100, fsfe-ie-request@fsfeurope.org wrote:
Today's Topics:
- Commission won't restart patents directive (Malcolm Tyrrell)
Message: 1 Date: Tue, 1 Mar 2005 10:41:55 +0000
From: "Malcolm Tyrrell" malcohol@eircom.net
Subject: [Fsfe-ie] Commission won't restart patents directive To: fsfe-ie@fsfeurope.org Message-ID: 20050301104157.50E9A1C448@crosspoint.fsfeurope.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
http://wiki.ffii.org/Com050228En
Sigh,
Malcohol.
Yes, sigh, - the FFII text is a bit incoherent, maybe illustrating the 'rage' of FFII; but do I take the text to mean that the EP will reject it if it goes back (after being passed as A, which should be unlikely)?
Short aside about the remaining legislative process:
The remaining stages would be: 2nd reading, Conciliation, and 3rd reading.
At 2nd reading in the EP, each amendment needs an absolute majority to pass; so does outright rejection. The Commission presumably believes this will heavily circumscribe the amendments that get passed.
At 2nd reading in the Council, amendments can only be considered on clauses the EP wants to change. They need unanimous support from the member states, if McC doesn't like them, or a qualified majority if he does.
If there is still distance between the Council and Parliament after 2nd reading, there is then a Conciliation phase where the sides try to hash out a final compromise on the remaining disputed articles, which goes to EP for 3rd reading.
At 3rd reading, the EP can reject the whole text by simple majority.
The key point therefore FFII is making, is that if the Council does approve its current text, and the Commission insists on pushing it to the Parliament for second reading, then it's much less likely that a Directive acceptable to all sides can emerge, and considerably more likely that the whole thing will get voted down at 3rd reading.
The civil servants at DG Market who want swpats may not care. They may calculate that Council 1st reading position is so much the tactical high ground in the whole legislative process (and perhaps know they wouldn't get it for this text a second time), that they are determined to try to get it through at all costs.
And they also know that even if it does ultimately get rejected by the Parliament at 3rd reading, the Commission can always try again with a new text after two years. So they may think it's worth a roll of the dice.
(This happened for the Gene Patent directive. After rejection by the parliament 1st time round, the Commission tried again, and the Parliament was convinced by an astroturfing campaign by the industry -- google "No patent no cure" for the sordid details).
Based on the short term thinking of pols I would not be so sure the EP would reject it - it could easily be 'negotiated' in the context of some other item the EP wants to get through.
Unusual -- party discipline is usually too weak and fragmented in the EP, so it's hard to reliably deliver trades across dossiers.
Back to the trenches.....if McC didn't support the decision to reject the restart (as seems likely) then did we make any progress on contacting his cabinet?
Indeed. Whatever happens, the Commission is absolutely central. We need these links -- why do they want to defend this text, and nothing but this text, *so* tenaciously ?
Plus: * It's not clear whether Council can pass its 1st reading text on Monday. * Parliament could even then ask the Commission to reconsider, and support restart anyway.
Bye, Barry
fsfe-ie@fsfeurope.org mailing list List information: http://mail.fsfeurope.org/pipermail/fsfe-ie Public archive: https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/fsfe-ie