Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Question 322: To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment if there is evidence that patents pending can be disclosed out of the Patents Office, particularly in relation to a person (details supplied) in Dublin 13; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27112/04]

Michael Ahern (Cork East, Fianna Fail)
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In common with legislation in most other countries, Irish law, section 28 of the Patents Act 1992, provides that a pending patent application shall be published, that is, made open to public inspection and therefore disclosed, as soon as practicable after the expiry of a period of 18 months from the filing date, or if the priority of an earlier application for the same invention is being claimed, 18 months from the date of filing of the earlier application. Up until the expiry of the 18 month period the description of the invention remains secret and is not disclosed by the Patents Office to anybody. An application which is withdrawn by the applicant prior to the expiry of the 18-month period is also never disclosed by the office.

The person involved currently has no applications pending at the Patents Office. He did submit four national applications for short term patents in the period from April 1999 to date. These applications were dealt with in accordance with the relevant national legislation. Three were deemed to be withdrawn prior to the expiry of the 18-month period and were, therefore, not published or made available to the public. A fourth application was published after the expiry of the 18-month period and was subsequently refused as the applicant had failed to remedy substantive defects in the application notified to him by the office.

This person also filed three international patent applications under the Patent Co-operation Treaty in the period June 2001 to October 2002. The Irish Patents Office acts as a receiving office for such applications and transmits them to the International Bureau of the World Intellectual Property Organisation and the European Patent Office following completion of a formalities check. Each of these applications claimed the priority of an earlier corresponding Irish application and each was published 18 months from the priority date in accordance with the provisions of the treaty.

I am advised that the Patents Office has had considerable correspondence with the person in question, in which it has repeatedly sought to explain the procedures and provisions in both Irish and international law which result in patent applications being published after 18 months unless withdrawn and to assure him that his patent applications which were withdrawn prior to the publication date have not been disclosed by the office.