Mr. Aidan Sweeney:

My colleagues have been before this committee quite recently on the TRIPS waiver issue. The TRIPS waiver and the UPC are two distinct, but important, issues. The commonality is patent. The UPC and the new unitary patent system concerns patents granted by the European Patent Office. There is always a choice to use national patents and opt out of the regime. It just happens that Ireland and Denmark are the only two countries that are required to have a referendum on this issue for legitimacy. The European Court of Justice, ECJ, will be over the unified patent court. There is always a sort of alignment with the current process.