mr president when i first came to this parliament in nineteen ninety-nine the single european patent was on the agenda
i remember working with klaus-heiner lehne on mrs palacio's report
i am pleased that we are starting to make some serious progress on it
we cannot underestimate the importance of this proposal to the competitiveness of the european economy
we are currently debating a very imaginative new plan from mrs geoghegan-quinn called the innovation union
this continent the european union needs to be more inventive
we need to create more inventions and exploit them more
it is absolutely indispensable that we have a competitive patent system
this enhanced cooperation move is an imaginative one to move the debate forward
i hope our spanish and italian colleagues will come into it but we cannot leave this waiting any longer because the whole world is after the innovation market
