The official site of the Prime Minister’s Office

More details from petition creator

Today's Free Software community creates a vast array of programs for the greater good of humanity as a whole. Proprietary software removes individuals' ability to cooperate. Free Software programs are used in research against disease, climate change, network security and powering 60% of websites. Software patents constitute a restriction on the free flow of ideas - such patents may risk slowing down continued development of Free Software. Main reasons why Free Software is important are in preserving the freedom of the individual within society, fighting disease and climate change with shared research tools, building on progress made in previous software innovations in exponentially more complex hardware implementations. Since software patents threaten these fundamentally important activities, we propose that software published under the GNU General Public Licence (version 3 and above) be given immunity from prosecution from patent infringement under the Copyright Designs and Patents Act.

Current signatories

Chris McGinlay, the Petition Creator, joined by:

• Andrew Main
• Iestyn Pryce
• Frederick Jones
• Roy Schestowitz
• Jonathan Kaye
• Mark Kent
• M Packer
• Guy Johnston
• Roderick Euan MacLean BSc
• Bruce Murray
• Muhammad R Tahir
• Brian Lawrence
• dan halbert
• Adam John Trickett
• Brian James Hadley
• Peter Bazira
• Maurice George
• Crispin Cooper
• kamran anvaar
• Sam Black
• David Spencer
• Warwick Mitchell
• Mike Hibbert
• John Rees
• Michelle Whelan
• Ricardo Gladwell
• Paul Madden
• Mike Shutlar
• Chris Godfrey
• Terry Piper
• Thomas Jollans
• Chris Blackburn
• Peter CAMPBELL-BANKS
• Peter Chynoweth
• Daniel Bond
• dave crossland
• Tristian
• Sam Thornton
• S.R.Sutherland
• Nick Willson
• Christopher Staite
• James Service
• Stephen Bell
• Jakub Witkiewicz
• Fuchsia Arnold
• Michael Platt
• Ray Britton
• Mark Trotman
• Tom Tamplin
• Margaret King
• Ian Ellis
• Aaron Johal
• Kevin Hamblett
• J Bryant