Of due dates and the soft shoe shuffle of Theresa May.
I worked for a firm of Patent Attorneys for many years….more indeed than I care to recall with any degree of accuracy.
The business of patents, trademarks, designs and copyright is over-run by dates: dates for paying fees; dates for responding to official actions from Patent offices; dates for grant of patents and trademarks; dates of their term; date for payment of renewal fees. Intellectual property might properly be summarised as a business of dates by legal design.
One of the first thing I learnt was always check a date with the issuing authority if you are unsure and the instruction is unclear or open to the slightest of doubts.
The second was to ask for this in writing and to ask for any response in writing and whether or not that appeared to also send a summary of your understanding of their requirement to them.
Belt and braces – you could just never be too cautious or too careful with dates.
My firm dealt with patent offices throughout the world but most business passed either through the UK Patent Office or the European Patent Office (EPO).
I mention because when dealing with any dates from the EPO or indeed any of the continental patent authorities it was absolutely standard that, unlike, our Common Law practice, their long established Roman Law practice had been to take the last day of response to the EPO or its judicial appeals tribunal as the numeral anniversary day regardless of intervening dates – even leap-days.
Thus an office action issued on 17 January for a 3 month response might in UK practice come due on midnight of 16 April but in Europe the standard practice would be midnight on 17th. The practice is an extension of that principle of Roman Law that doubt always favours a litigant.
The Home Office – one of the great offices of State – must surely have lawyers who know something of these matters? And what cpmpetent Home Secretary might be induced to act upon the basis of advice over a due date without seeking a belt and braces confirmation from a court or in its absence asking for the same? An email would suffice…
This speaks to a world where our politicians for all they know, know much less of the world than they think they know.
Is this a matter for resignation – yes, but only on the part of a public wearied by over-briefed but under-trained politicians posing as Masters of the Universe and Mistresses of Detail.
Nor has this been Mrs May first run-in with legal practice. Two words come to mind: Brodie Clark.
But it seems never taught to hesitate where wise men fear to tread, Mrs May‘s fancy shoes just walked straight into another legal mess.
As our very own Oliver Hardy in Downing Street May ruefully observe – that’s another fine mess you got me in….