Pat Conroy (Charlton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The main purpose of the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment Bill 2014 is to implement the WTO's Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Protocol, known as the TRIPS Protocol. This is an agreement that enables a country that is experiencing a serious epidemic to access patented drugs and for countries with limited or no manufacturing capacity to access patented pharmaceuticals made under compulsory licence in another WTO country. The TRIPS Protocol encourages patent owners to either provide medicines to least developed countries at affordable prices or to issue a voluntary licence to generic manufacturers to provide medicines at affordable prices. If a patent owner is unwilling to do either of these things, the protocol provides a mechanism to force the patent owner to issue a compulsory licence.

Australia has been a signatory to the TRIPS Agreement since 2007 but has yet to implement these provisions via legislation. I will highlight, later in my contribution, some of the reasons for this delay. Other aspects of the bill include amendments to the Plant Breeder's Rights Act to allow disputes over IP infringements to be heard in the Federal Circuit Court, which I think it is good move—as highlighted by the member for Hughes in his contribution.

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