Re: [Fsfe-uk] Software Patents

[Alex Hudson]

Hi Simon,

On Sat, 2004-12-18 at 05:20 +0000, Simon Waters wrote:
> | - If the Directive is sent back, rather than restarted, it will be in
> | the 2nd reading. *However*, new amendments may still be tabled, so
> there
> | is still hope!
> 
> Silly question - but is there a way directives can simply fail/be
> defeated?

http://www.softwarepatents.co.uk/current/

(The main graph is the 'longest route'; at any time we could go down a
dotted line instead)

Once it gets to the 2nd Parliament reading (assuming they don't restart
the process), any institution from that point onward can vote to accept,
amend or reject the directive. 

To be honest, we probably don't want the directive to fail. As bad as
the EU process is, we do at least have representatives in the process.
If they decide to bin it and go for an intra-governmental trade
negotiation (or similar), it will just happen and we will have zero
input.

> I read several descriptions of the process, and it seemed the worst
> that ever happens is it go back for some sort of negoiation process
> between parliament and council, or is this the "diplomatic" way of
> burying bad legislation?

I don't know how often they fail, but it's not often - I think it takes
an absolute majority vote of whichever institution it is to take a
'dotted line' shortcut. Conciliation is supposed to be a good attempt at
finding a text which is acceptable to both parties, and generally works
- conciliated text is very rarely dropped. So, in fact, instead of being
buried, the directive would be even more likely to succeed.

Cheers,

Alex.