ON THE PATENT LAWS. 191 



The Patent Laws. — Report of Committee on the Patent Laws. 

 Presented by W. Fairbairn, F.R.S. 



At the meeting of the British Association at Leeds for the year 1858, a 

 Committee was re-appointed for the purpose of taking such steps as might be 

 necessary to render the Patent System of this country, and the funds derived 

 from inventors, more efficient and available for the reward of the meritorious 

 inventors and the advancement of science. 



Circumstances beyond control have prevented that Committee from 

 taking any decisive steps in furtherance of the important objects entrusted 

 to them ; but those objects have not been lost sight of. No reply has been 

 received from the Commissioners of Patents, either to the Memorial of the 

 Glasgow Committee of the British Association, or of the Public Meeting in 

 Manchester ; but some of the questions referred to in those Memorials are 

 adverted to in the Report of the Commissioners just issued. From that Report, 

 itappears that the number of applications for patents maybe estimated atabout 

 3000 per annum ; that of these 2000 applications not more than about 2000 

 proceed to the final stage of a patent; and that of the 2000 patents granted, 

 not more than 550 are kept alive beyond three years by the first periodical 

 payment of £50 before the expiration of that term ; and the Commissioners 

 anticipate that the fee of £100 payable at the end of the seventh year will 

 not be paid on more than 100 of the surviving 550 patents. Should this 

 anticipation prove correct, the payment by inventors in fees upon patents 

 not surviving beyond one half their term of fourteen years will not be less 

 than at the rate of £100,000 per annum as a direct tax on the inventive 

 genius of the country, in addition to and exclusive of time, labour, and 

 other charges and expenses. 



The total outlay in respect of those patents may be estimated as at least 

 £250,000, or a quarter of a million, per annum. The great work of printing 

 and publishing in extenso the specifications of patents granted under the 

 old law, that is, from 1711 to the 1st of Oct. 1852, in number 12,977, is 

 completed ; and the surplus funds hitherto absorbed by this object will be 

 henceforth available for other purposes. 



That surplus is estimated by the Commissioners at £30,000 for the 

 current year 1858-59, and to increase in each succeeding year at the rate of 

 £20,000 per annum. This surplus, after providing for the current expenses, 

 is proposed by the Commissioners to be appropriated to the following 

 objects : — 



1. The erection of a Museum for the preservation and exhibition of 

 models, of which a considerable collection already exists at Kensington. 



2. The erection of suitable offices for the Commissioners, including a free 

 library of consultation upon a more extended scale than already formed by 

 Mr. Woodcroft. 



These most desirable and legitimate objects of application of the " Inven- 

 tors' Fee Fund" cannot, however, be attained without the sanction of the 

 Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury, and a vote of Parliament, 

 inasmuch as all the fees levied on Inventors are by a recent change levied in 

 the shape of stamps, and so pass directly into the Consolidated Fund. 



These recommendatiuns of the Commissioners will, it is conceived, be 

 regarded as a most legitimate application of the funds of Inventors, and as 

 one to which the Parliamentary Committee of the British Association will 

 give their aid ; but your Committee think that other considerations and other 

 claims upon the Inventors' Fee Fund, and upon the annual surplus, whatever 



