mr president i thank the commissioner for his contribution
commissioner you said at the end of your contribution that you have heard our concerns and you are responding to them
well i think as they say up to a point
i am not convinced that you have entirely grasped all our concerns about the acta negotiations
it is true that there is common ground between us in terms of the fact that ipr right holders deserve a fair return on their rights but counterfeit goods can and do sometimes pose a threat to human health
so like you we are not against international cooperation to tackle piracy to tackle counterfeiting and to deal with other abuses of intellectual property rights
but we repeat it has to be based on the existing
if you are giving us an absolute assurance on that then i accept it but you said you were not going to do it through the back door which it seemed to me still gave you the opportunity to do it through the front door but if you are saying absolutely no move to the then i am pleased to hear that and i accept your word on that
similarly you said you would not criminalise individuals for downloading from the internet but then you talked about the external borders of the community and what might happen with people going away rather than coming into the eu so again we do not want anything in acta which criminalises anyone for individual use
even though we might frown on it nobody should be criminalised for personal use of copyright material
of course any action through acta has to be proportional to the aims
it is not a blank cheque for copyright holders
the problem as other members have said is that we do not know the situation because of the secrecy surrounding this
i welcome the fact that you have given a strong commitment to get the draft negotiating text and that you will put pressure on the other parties
i think you have to tell the other parties though that this will not strengthen you as a negotiator it will weaken you as a negotiator if you cannot release the draft text because you will not have as was very clear tonight the support of this house if we cannot see the draft text on which you are working
finally on a positive note i welcome your comments on generic medicine and i look forward to seeing the review of the customs regulation
