Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing) Share this | Hansard source

The Labor opposition is not supporting this amendment today. We recognise that this amendment would strike at the heart of the overall intent of the bill, which is to address the problem in relation to the low innovation threshold, which has proven more harmful than helpful, including for small to medium enterprises. We've seen a multitude of low-value patents covering everything from a pet bed to a pizza box that converts to a bib. This, in turn, has reduced the credibility that patents provide for attracting finance for commercialisation.

We've accepted that these are key issues with the current regime, and the amendments moved by Senator Patrick strike at the heart of some of the things that, with the government, we agree need to be addressed. We're concerned that we've only come some of the way in addressing the issues that this legislation has been brought before the chamber to address. We note that our amendments, which have been successful, will provide more time to address these issues, but we're very concerned that, on this government's watch, Australia's innovation ranking has fallen on the World Intellectual Property Organization's Global Innovation Index. We urge the government to address the need for greater support for Australian SMEs in protecting their intellectual property through the standard patent. Having said that, we affirm that we are opposing these amendments.