EPO “not aware” of future demonstrations

The European Patent Office (EPO) has said it is not expecting further demonstrations following a protest at its headquarters last week.

According to an EPO spokesman, around “600-800” staff held a demonstration at the office in Munich.

The action, which took place on March 27 following three days of strike action, was said to be peaceful.

Last week, WIPR reported that disgruntled staff were due to strike on March 21, 24 and 25.

They are set to strike again from April 14-17, but the office told WIPR it was not aware of any more demonstrations.

“To my knowledge, there are strike days planned but no demonstrations,” an EPO spokesman said.

More than 4,000 of the office’s 6,000 workers voted on the proposals to strike, with around 90 percent voting in favour of taking action.

The reasons for last week’s demonstration has not been made public but one source told WIPR there had been a “gathering” related to issues within the human resources department.

According to the IPKat blog, staff highlighted six reasons for striking, which have been referred to as PEACES.

They are: presidential communication (P), e-mails, with a call for a block on union-related mail-outs to be lifted (E), adoption of social democracy (A), changes to the office’s disciplinary committee (C) and that strike regulation changes be withdrawn (S).

Presidential communication refers to EPO president Benoît Battistelli, who has allegedly been criticised for his trivialisation of unrest within EPO headquarters.

Among the criticisms, it was claimed that the countries represented by the organisation were not sufficiently represented among the staff.