European Patent Office Staff Representatives Report "Understaffing Combined With Unhealthy Working Pressure in Many Units" to the Overseeing Body of the European Patent Organisation (EPO)
Not a mistake; this is deliberate (to lower the capacity and quality of scrutiny of patent applications)
A FEW months back the EPO's Central Staff Committee (CSC), which gets elected by EPO staff, reported that under António Campinos things continue to worsen in line with Benoît Battistelli's horrible and often patently illegal policies.
Colleagues were told by the CSC about a meeting that celebrated a pseudo-milestone at a time of great crisis for the Office, where corruption had become the "new normal" and laws were simply not followed. To quote: "The agenda of the recent meeting of the Council, which took place on the day after the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the European Patent Convention, was rather short. The most important items were the Office’s activities report and the President of the Boards of Appeal’s activities report. The Staff Representatives cast a critical eye on the EPO’s recruitment policy resulting in understaffing combined with unhealthy working pressure in many units. Software tools would not replace the intellectual work of staff. Only a sincere shift in the orientation of the career system from quantity to quality would meet the needs of users and most importantly society."
As shown in leaks from 2022, the EPO intentionally violates the European Patent Convention to fake so-called 'production' and profit from phony patent monopolies, including software patents. This is a very serious matter. It serves to obliterate the European software industry, not just Free software development.
The following publication from the CSC clearly notes the issue of understaffing, as more recently covered in other publications. The CSC has been cautioning about this for years already.
Here is the full text in HTML, Plain Text, and GemText:
Zentraler Personalausschuss
Central Staff Committee
Le Comité Central du PersonnelMunich, 24-10-2023
sc23128cpReport on the 176th meeting of the Administrative Council of 6 October 2023
Dear Colleagues,
The agenda of the recent meeting of the Council, which took place on the day after the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the European Patent Convention, was rather short. The most important items were the Office’s activities report and the President of the Boards of Appeal’s activities report.
When presenting the Office’s activities report, the President focused on the recent recruitment of 79 Young Professionals, the Campus Days and his view on the work-life balance of staff. VP 1 showed figures on meetings with user associations so as to illustrate the Office’s attempts to achieve better quality. Mr Requena presented the biennial work plan of the Observatory on Patents and Technology. The update on IT matters referred more to co-operation projects with NPOs than to software used internally in search and examination.
Many delegations appreciated the co-operations and support by the EPO as to IT projects. They congratulated for the 50th anniversary of the EPC and the launch of the Observatory. The quality debate in the Council was less intense than in the meetings before. The few critical contributions mainly referred to the need for a better overview on software deliveries, the risk of concentrating too much on online work, and a decline in search numbers.
The Staff Representatives cast a critical eye on the EPO’s recruitment policy resulting in understaffing combined with unhealthy working pressure in many units. Software tools would not replace the intellectual work of staff. Only a sincere shift in the orientation of the career system from quantity to quality would meet the needs of users and most importantly society.
The delegates appreciated the reduction of the backlog in the Boards of Appeal upon Mr Josefsson’s report. He reported also from user consultations on timeliness and video conferences. The Staff Representatives underscored that the independence of the Boards of Appeal was a key element of the EPC. The 23% decrease in appeals in the first half of 2023 compared to the same period last year was a cause for concern.
For the Council itself, it was important to elect a new member of the “Board 28”. The task of this panel, named after Article 28 EPC, is to assist the Chairperson in preparing the work of the Council. Mr Margus Viher (EE) will replace Sune Stampe Sørensen (DK), whose term of office expires on 14 December 2023.
The Central Staff Committee
We hope that putting this in the public domain will help illuminate the very real issues, which are collectively expressed by staff through their already-repressed representatives. █
