Summary
After over one hundred written submissions, two days of hearings
and two extensions of time in which to report, the Senate Legal and
Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee Report into the Gene
Patent Amendment Bill 2010 was tabled in the Senate on 21 September
2011.
The Committee made one recommendation, namely that the Senate
should not pass the Bill.
Background
Originally, the Gene Patent Amendment Bill 2010 proposed an
amendment to the Patents Act 1990 which would exclude from
patentability "biological materials including
their components and derivatives, whether isolated or purified or
not and however made, which are identical or substantially
identical to such materials as they exist in nature".
Strong criticism that the terms "components",
"derivatives" and "substantially identical"
would introduce uncertainty into the patent system resulted in the
proposed amendment being narrowed. The new proposed amendment
excluded "biological
