[ILUG] All is not yet lost...

[Colm Buckley]

Received this from a member of Proinsias de Rossa's staff (the only MEP 
yet to respond to my emails).

Begin forwarded message:

> Date: 8 March 2005 10:22:22 GMT
> To: "Colm Buckley" <colm at google.com>
> Subject: RE: Directive on patentability (again)
>
> Colm,
>
> Thanks for your message. Following yesterday's decision in the
> Competitiveness Council, the EP has requested that the Commission make 
> a
> statement to the EP Plenary tomorrow in Strasbourg at 6.00pm. MEPs are
> awaiting with considerable interest to see what the Commission has to
> say but it's important to remember that the EP has the right to retable
> any of its first reading amendments not taken up in the Council's 
> common
> position, which the EP has yet to see, or to reject the common position
> in its entirity. If Council still refuses to accept them, a
> 'conciliation committee' of MEPs and national civil servants will meet
> to reach a compromise. If none is found, the proposal falls. The
> important point is that the Ministers do not take the final decision on
> this issue - they must work with the EP.
>
> We'll keep you posted.
>
> Yours sincerely,
>
> Gerard Gibbons

-- 
Colm Buckley / colm at google.com / +353 87 2469146