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Theft of an asset - UK authorities, The Crown of Great Britain and the EU Transport Commission chall
Added: (Sat Nov 29 2003)
PRESS RELEASE
SUNDAY 9TH NOVEMBER 2003
in respect of the following application.
David & Nansi Mottram –v- The UK Authorities, The Crown of Great Britain & The European Transport Commission,
Application under Article 1 of The Human Rights Act – deprivation of an asset known as registered design 2053070, registered at The UK Patent Office.
1. When the UK Government want something– they steal it!
2. Attached copy of an application under Article 1 of The Human Rights Act, from reading the application you will establish that inter- governmental collusion is rife, aided and abetted by the EU Transport Commission.
3. The DTI and Patent Office in 1995, encouraged individuals and businesses to patent and copyrights their ideas, innovation was their buzz- word.
4. My wife and I came up with a set of simple designs and a business plan for a new venture. We visited the Patent Office and read their advertising material. We were assigned a senior patent advisor – Mr. Arthur Chinnery, who on two occasions when we visited the Patent Office gave us advice upon the registration of our set of designs. The next step was payment of fees to the Government office in respect of the registration of our ideas.
5. We successfully registered our 8 designs, after the laborious searches made by the senior patent advisor assigned to us (we were informed that the searches made by government officials covered a period of the previous 25 years, checking to see whether anything similar was in the public domain or in industrial circles), one requirement that was made though, was that we obtained permission from The UK Flag Institute to utilise the flags that were in the designs and to obtain confirmation that there was no copyright held within the individual flags themselves. We produced a letter from Dr. William Crampton, director of The UK Flag Institute that confirmed that there was no copyright in the use of flags in the manner in which we had used them and that the copyright within our designs was indeed our copyright because of the manner in which the designs were put together. We had gone to further expense in obtaining this information from the Flag Institute.
6. Some months later the Patent Office issued our certificates of registration of a design, for all 8 designs, attached to the certificate was the original sketch drawing.
7. We then set about our new business venture, in respect of producing our designs. Over £250,000 was introduced for advertising, purchase of machinery, goods, site – general capital injection for the venture. Yes, we had entered into the maze of the competitive motoring industry!
8. What a joke it became and how significantly corrupt it all was. Our business UK NUMBER PLATES displaying in particular our registered design number 2053070, a blue band on the left hand side of the number plate with the Euro-symbol of 12 gold stars above the country identifier of GB below.
9. We wrote to the Department of Transport from 1995 through to 1999, a Mr. Stephen Clarke, senior policy advisor requested on two occasions samples of the designs, we, again at our cost had these made complying with the request of the Government department. They were copied by the department and the samples returned to us by recorded mail.
10. In all correspondence Stephen Clarke, referred to the designs as ‘your designs’ and further went on to inform us that if we produced them for vehicles they would be classed as illegal as government regulations clearly defined what could be printed onto a vehicle registration plate – solely the registration mark. We queried this as practically all vehicle licence plates, including police cars at that time (1996), had in excess of what the regulations quoted as legal for a registration plate –to include garage provider or manufacturers advertising.
There was no reply to this point, but Mr. Clarke specifically said there was no intention of incorporating your design the euro- symbol onto vehicle registration plates.
11. We continued to manufacture our designs onto number plates, to include all of the other flag designs that we held, but we were experiencing problems in obtaining raw material. The larger number plate suppliers were refusing to supply us with material, all citing ‘conflict of interest’. The whole number plate industry seemed to be in each other’s pockets. We had heard of an association -the British Number Plate Manufacturers Association – BNPMA, we applied to join and were refused. This was in 1996. We soon learnt that this was practically a quango, made up of the major number plate manufacturers. It was an organisation with no direct address, phone number only a PO box situated at the HQ of one of the aforementioned manufacturers.
We were refused membership – ‘conflict of interest’ was once again the reason.
12. The DVLA – Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency – an agency of the Dept Transport recommends the members of the BNPMA in their advertising media, which undoubtedly proves that there is influence between some of the UK number plate manufacturers and the UK government. This is mainly the larger manufacturers – who hold a monopoly over the industry and the association BNPMA .
13. In 1996, we wrote to Commissioner Neil Kinnock, the European Transport Minister at the European Commission in Brussels, following an article that had appeared in The Daily Mail, which quoted him as stating that the Euro-symbol of 12 gold stars above the country identifier, situated on a blue band on the left hand side of the number plate was to become legal in the UK. We introduced our registered designs to him and drew his attention to the fact that they had been registered long before the publication of the news article.
Following our correspondence we spoke with Mr. Kinnock, and his assistant Mr. Jan Van Koopman, they praised us for our ingenuity with regard to the designs for number plates and said that many calls had been received following the publication of the article. It was said that the article was a mis-quote and there were no discussions, proposals or plans at that time to legalise that style of number plate for the UK.
14. Throughout the years from 1996, to 1999 there was a great deal of correspondence between us and the UK authorities, also with the European Commission (Transport section). It was in 1999 that a consultation exercise was launched by the UK transport authorities regarding number plates – although our manufacturing of our designs had effectively ceased as we had been squeezed out of the market by the major players, we were added to the consultation under the heading ‘Motor and Number plate Trade’. On numerous occasions we offered the UK authorities a licence to produce registered design 2053070, all through the timescale of correspondence we offered assistance.
15. In August 2001, by chance we discovered that a Statutory Instrument – number 561 of 2001, had been passed by the UK government and legalised with effect from 1st. September 2001, registered design 2053070 – the euro symbol of 12 gold stars above the country identifier ‘GB’ on a blue background.
16. We contacted Stephen Clarke at the Dept Transport and he informed us that this area of policy was now devolved to DVLA in South Wales – a Mr. Pick.
17. We contacted Mr. Robert Pick at DVLA and asked why our design had been legalised without our permission. He was astounded and confirmed he knew nothing of the design. We asked that he conduct a search of the register at the patent office and contact Stephen Clarke at Dept transport, who had full knowledge of the situation.
Pick contacted us later, confirming that it was indeed our design and that the situation needed addressing immediately.
18. A later conversation with him drew the response that the UK was only following a EU Directive. We immediately contacted the EU Transport Commissioner, Senora del Palacio and the head of the EU Transport section Mr. Francois Lamoureux, notifying them of the designs and reminded them that Transport Commissioner Kinnock and the Transport Section Mr. Jan Van Koopman, knew of the registered designs in 1996 and that the designs had been registered some 3 years prior to the EU Directive.
19. At this time we wrote direct to the Prime Minister Mr. Blair stating that unless the matter was addressed immediately and the pirating of the design by government encouragement cease, we would apply for an injunction to stop it being utilised from 1st. September. Mr. Blair, telephoned us personally and confirmed that the situation needed addressing. To date he has not addressed the situation – this is now over 2 years ago.
20. The DVLA website, http://www.dvla.gov.uk/vehicles/reg_marks_newrules.htm refers to our registered design as Crown copyright – which it is not, this is still the current situation, despite Mr. Picks protestations that the matter would be addressed. He further stated that his department at DVLA knew nothing of the designs until I telephoned him in 2001, this is untrue, his senior officer Mrs. Maureen Price was notified of the designs in 1996, when we wrote to her at DVLA following the publication in the Welsh press, of a letter written by her criticising our designs as illegal.
They were fully aware of all the designs and as the policy division had done before them, they chose to ignore them.
21. The aforementioned Mrs. Price wrote to us in August 2001, on behalf of the Secretary of State Mr. Byers. In that correspondence she wrote that the Secretary of State did not consider that our registered design was the same as the one described in legislation, furthermore the relevant Statutory Instrument was deliberately mis-quoted, to deliberately eliminate the author from responsibility. The SI quoted was SI 526 of 2001 not 561 of 2001 and related to the Enfield health trust. (Details of SI 526/2001 can be found via a search of the internet using the SI number).
22. We were continuing at this time – August 2001, to correspond with the relevant Ministers, Secretary of State for Transport, Prime Minister – to no effect, other than Mr. Spellar the Transport Minister announcing a review of the new vehicle number plates to possibly include various flag designs – ie Scotish saltire, Welsh dragon, Union flag, Cross od St. George – all of which we had registered back in 1995.
He announced a consultation based on ‘technical developments’ having come to light. As far as we are aware there was no consultation, but at the end of that year Mr. Spellar unveiled his new designs, which removed the EU symbol from the plate and bore only a flag on the left hand side of the number plate. He conceded that motoring in Europe would also require the driver to affix a EU symbol sticker to the vehicle!
23. The whole purpose of design and copyright law is protection and to allow the intellectual property owner the right to exploit their designs in the knowledge that there is protection afforded to them.
24. We spoke with the Patent office about this ordeal asking to speak with the person ultimately responsibly for it’s activities. This was Mr. Philpott, I spoke to Mr. Philpott, and mentioned that I was not happy and failed to see the purpose of the Patent office at this stage I did not give our name but simply said that we held a series of registered designs and that they were flag designs for number plates, he was immediately aware of who we were.
25. He said we were only at a loss of £480 that could be refunded. I explained to him that the reason for contacting the Patent Office was not to lay complaint, but to notify him of the current valuation that we had received from an independent valuer and our costs over the previous 6 years in respect of commercially marketing and manufacturing our designs. The government valuers had valued our intellectual property at £18.5 million. This was based on there being 22.5 million vehicles on the road and over 2.5 new vehicles each year, with a reasonable considered royalty return suggested at £1.00 per design paid by the manufacturer. The marketing costs, start up costs and general business fees, based on our new business was in excess of £250,000 at that stage. We further informed him that not only had the initial registration fees of £480 been paid, but that further extension fees had been paid to the Patent office. What we found to be astonishing was Mr. Philpott stating that because of our designs, the use of national flags in design law was no longer permissible. This he said was a directive from the Secretary of State. I asked him why the Patent office accepted further extension fees, full knowing that the government in power had chosen to ignore the registered design and had set out to steal it.
26. I informed Mr. Philpott that I was not laying any claim against The Patent Office and I would only do so if a Court had ordered that the registered designs were registered wrongly after us taking advice from a senior design civil servant employed by The Patent Office in 1995.
27. It is clear that the Patent office – an agency of the DTI holds no strength or respect within any other area of the Blair government, as has been shown here. If another government department wants your design, in our case the Transport department, they will take it.
28. Imagine if the Patent office was not a government body, but in the private sector – it takes your fees, gives advice, takes further fees and offers you a service that it does not provide, then another part of the group, if it was a private entity could steal, what the patent office was purporting to grant you, to any clear thinking individual this would be fraud and more importantly within the situation as it is a government agency, that the fees that were generated from the registration of the designs goes into the same coffers as those who have stolen the property.
29. We continued writing to the EU Commission and were asked by a Senor Diego Canga Fano, who had contacted the UK authorities and writing on behalf of the EU Transport Commissioner Senora Palacio, to await the outcome of the UK legal services investigation.
30. We abided by this decision and waited 9 months until June 2002, then we contacted Senor Canga Fano again. We advised that we had received no correspondence, again he said he would deal with the matter, we wrote again and advised that we would be pursuing a claim under the Human Rights Act – Article 1 deprivation of an asset. Senor Canga Fano telephoned and said we should proceed under R266 of The Treaty. In August 2002, we followed that advice and submitted all our paperwork to the EU Transport Commission and Senor Canga Fano promised he would deal with it under R266 of The Treaty and also submit it to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg.
31. Again, some time passed and I and my solicitors contacted Senor Canga Fano, his secretary promised my solicitor that there was a letter in the post stating that the Directive was a mistake. This was later said to be a deliberate lie by the secretary, there was no letter in the post and according to Senor Canga Fano the situation was to be addressed.
32. Senor Canga Fano later telephoned us one evening at our home, explaining that the situation was complicated, in reply to this we issued a fax referring to fact and representations that had been made by both parties. We heard nothing again until January 2003, when I telephoned Senor Diego Canga Fano, he said that the matter was being looked at by the Director General and he promised an independent enquiry.
33. We were later contacted by correspondence by the Secretariat General. We were duly awarded a case reference number 2003/4036 SG(2003)A/628 and again promised an independent investigation.
34. Time again passed, the UK were still pirating the design, using their excuse of ‘only following a EU Directive 2411/98’.
35. In May 2003, we received a reply from a Marie Wolfcarius who is head of Transport A section at the EU transport Commission, one of her areas of policy is ‘competition and user’s rights’ She informed us that our design was widely known to the public authorities and in industrial circles as early as late 80’s early 90’s and that the Commission would be taking steps to annul the designs or any other designs that allow a monopoly over the use of the EU symbol of 12 gold stars and the abbreviation of member states names being used on vehicle registration plates. Deliberately misrepresenting the facts for only one purpose – an attempt to give influence that registered design 2053070 was known and in existence prior to the date of its registration – which it clearly was not.
36. She misrepresented deliberately, that an initial proposal document dealing with the harmonisation of member states registration plates dated 1997, was in fact a memorandum document. In fact as an initial proposal document this was the first time that the matter regarding the use of the EU symbol of 12 gold stars and the member states abbreviated name would have become known in public. This is 2 years after design 2053070 was registered.
She further said that the Commission had been working on different models of European plates since the end of the 1980’s and that the evidence of this were the models, included in the annexe to the Regulation EC 2411/98.
The evidence that she relied upon were the number plate models were those using NL for the Nederlands and E for Spain. Neither of these models were known in industrial circles or the public domain as they were generated specifically as the annexe to EU Directive 2411/98. More importantly, that Directive and models were some three years after the registration of design number 2053070. She therefore was under the misapprehension that one should imagine the Euro symbol and GB being the country of origin and that one should imagine the date of this as being prior to 1995.
37. Basically, she was stating that it didn’t suit the EU Commission to allow the designs to stand as they proved a contentious issue bearing in mind that they were registered years before the issue of the EU Directive 2411/98.
38. In reply we asked her to provide her evidence of the design 2053070 being widely known in the various areas and also that she provide us with material evidence that could be scientifically dated to prove its existence prior to the registration of the designs. Also we asked that the details of the law be provided that allowed for the EU Commission to annul the designs that had been correctly registered following UK patent law.
39. To date no evidence or material has been provided by Ms. Wolfcarius, notwithstanding we wrote again asking for the evidence to be provided within 7 days of 3rd August 2003, and also to The President of The European Commission Senor Romano Prodi, who wrote to us to confirm that our written request had been forwarded onto Ms. Wolfcarius. No material evidence could be provided because the representations made by The EU transport Commission were lies.
Still no material evidence has been forthcoming.
40. We wrote formally to make our complaint to the President of the EU Commission – Senor Romano Prodi, a reply from his aide stated that ‘an in – depth investigation’ would be carried out. A reply on behalf of the President of the EU Commission Senor Prodi was written by the aforementioned Ms. Wolfcarius. This indicated that the EU Transport Commission, party to the original complaint had unlawfully investigated itself, attempting to excuse itself by false representations.
Senor Prodi has reneged on his promise of an in depth investigation and has associated himself with criminality in the theft of the registered design 2053070.
41. It is clear that no investigation has been carried out and the whole matter is an in house cover up, the situation being that the UK authorities and the EU Commission had both conspired to steal registered design number 2053070 and had both liaised to excuse themselves from blame on infringement and made false and inaccurate excuses in compliance with no evidence.
42. We were of the opinion that the EU was in existence to show fairness not bias and to act impartially upon fact and evidence clearly the Commission has not only acted unlawfully, but has acted criminally.
43. The Crown and The Crown Stationers made false representations in material form that registered design 2053070 belonged to The Crown and is covered by Crown copyright full knowing that it had been registered at The Crown’s Patent Office in 1995. Therefore obtaining the design without the permission of the rightful owners.
David and Nansi Mottram –v- The UK Authorities, The Crown of great Britain and The EU Transport Commission, under Article 1 of the Human Rights Act.
David and Nansi Mottram –v- The UK Authorities, The Crown of Great Britain, and The EU Transport Commission, under The Civil and Criminal Justice Act.
This press release is issued by David and Nansi Mottram and is based upon fact. Any journalist or reporter requiring proof or clarification of any documentation referred to above may formally contact David Mottram-
1. davidmottram@terra.es
2. by phone 00 34 630 500 356