Here's a statement from the Stockholm Network on the EU Patent Directive decision. I reproduce in full because I can't find a link on their site. The Stockhold Network is a group of free-market think tanks in Europe.

For further information, contact:

Dr Meir Pugatch on 00972-505-592941
For immediate release

Thursday 7th July 2005

EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT DECISION UNDERMINES LISBON AGENDA, SAYS THINK TANK

Yestersday’s decision by the European Parliament to reject the Council Common Position on the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive (CIID) will damage the climate for innovation in Europe and increase the growing innovation gap between Europe and other leading trading blocks, according to the Stockholm Network, a European think tank.

“In 2000, European Heads of State established the Lisbon Agenda, a strategic goal for the European Union to become the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world by 2010. Innovation was recognised to be at the core of this strategy. But, five years later, indicators suggest that the innovation gap between the EU, the US and Japan have not been narrowed and may even have increased”, said Dr Meir Pugatch, who runs the Stockholm Network’s Intellectual Property Programme.

In its original form, the proposed CII directive did not aim to patent software, but rather to allow the patentability of computer-based inventions. The term 'software patent', which has now became the standard jargon, is completely mistaken. Instead, the directive aimed to achieve greater harmonisation among the different patent offices with regard to the patentability of ‘computer-implemented inventions’. Later drafts, including the current draft, muddied the waters and threatened to turn these aims on their head. If they support the Libson agenda, MEPs now need to go back to the drawing board to find a solution closer to the original goals.

The report of the High Level Group, chaired by Wim Kok, dated November 2004, states: "most urgently, the EU should adopt the pending proposal on the patenting of computer-implemented inventions and, of course, the Community patent".

“Without a more efficient alternative - that will both reward scientific and technological innovation and ensure the rapid dissemination of existing technologies – then we should stick with the patent system and improve it. And, if we support the patent system, then there is no logical reason for us to deny the option of patentability for any type of technology, including computer implemented inventions”, Dr Pugatch says.

-ENDS-