Finance committee  Yes, absolutely. Regardless of the size of your business, if you're unable to respond to a patent office request in a timely manner, you may lose your rights, absolutely. By granting an opportunity for the commissioner to declare a force majeure event and extend the time to respond—for example when you're office is flooded and you can't get to your materials—it preserves those rights for those companies.

Finance committee  Make them more efficient? I think it grants them the ability to deal with situations, if the commissioner were to declare a date of that kind, to be able to respond on behalf of their clients in a manner they would not otherwise be able to do.

Finance committee  As I mentioned in my testimony, countries such as the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand, for example, have established laws to extend privilege to communications between intellectual property advisers and their clients. Intellectual property rights, such as patent and trademark rights, are international in scope.

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm here to speak to part 3, division 3, clauses 44 to 72 on intellectual property. My name is Jeffrey Astle. I'm appearing on behalf of the Intellectual Property Institute of Canada, or IPIC. I serve on IPIC's governing council as the immediate past president.