EU top judges plea for patent court

Some of the top patent judges in Europe are pleading for a unified first instance European patent court. After all, there is a European Patent Office, but the patents must be enforced in the national jursidictions, which creates a patchy and unneven application of patent rules and produce the wildy ranging practice in subjects like software patents. Lord Justice Jacob is quoted as saying:

“There have been proposals for a European patent court since the 1950s and the latest proposals produced by the Commission were massively defective, so we need to sort this out for the sake of European industry.”

I thouroughly agree with a European court, but it will be difficult to campaign for this as the cause just does not lend itself to small and effective chants. “What do we want? An European Patent Court and an European patent litigation agreement! When do we want it? Now!”