48 & 49 VICT. C. 63.

Specifications, &c., not to be published unless applica

A complete specification may be left and accepted within such extended times, not exceeding one month and three months respectively after the said nine1 and twelve months respectively as the Comptroller may on payment of the prescribed fee allow, and where such extension of time has been allowed, a further extension of four months after the said fifteen months shall be allowed for the sealing of the patent; and the principal Act shall have effect as if any time so allowed were added to the said periods specified in the principal Act.

4. Where an application for a patent has been abandoned, or become void, the specification or specifications and drawings (if tion accepted. any) accompanying or left in connection with such application, shall not at any time be open to public inspection or be published by the Comptroller.

Power to grant patents to

several persons jointly.

Amendment

of sect. 103 of 46 & 47 Vict.

c. 57.

5. Whereas doubts have arisen whether under the principal Act a patent may lawfully be granted to several persons jointly, some or one of whom only are or is the true and first inventors or inventor; be it therefore enacted and declared that it has been and is lawful under the principal Act to grant such a patent.

6. In sub-section one of section one hundred and three of the principal Act, the words "date of the application" shall be substituted for the words "date of the protection obtained."

1 This period is now six months by 2 Edw. VII. c. 34, sect. I.

THE PATENTS ACT, 1886.

(49 & 50 VICT. C. 37).

An Act to remove certain doubts respecting the construction of the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, so far as respects the drawings by which specifications are required to be accompanied, and as respects exhibitions.

[25th June, 1886.]

A.D. 1886.

c. 57.

WHEREAS by section five of the Patents, Designs, and Trade 46 & 47 Vict. Marks Act, 1883, specifications, whether provisional or complete, must be accompanied by drawings if required, and doubts have arisen as to whether it is sufficient that a complete specification refers to the drawings by which the provisional specification was accompanied, and it is expedient to remove such doubts:

Be it therefore enacted, &c.

construction.

1. This Act may be cited as the Patents Act, 1886, and shall Short title and be construed as one with the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Acts, 1883 (46 & 47 Vict. c. 57) and 1885 (48 & 49 Vict. c. 63), and, together with those Acts, may be cited as the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Acts, 1883 to 1886.

2. The requirement of sub-section four of section five of the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, as to drawings shall not be deemed to be insufficiently complied with by reason only that instead of being accompanied by drawings the complete specification refers to the drawings which accompanied the provisional specification. And no patent heretofore sealed shall be invalid by reason only that the complete specification was not accompanied by drawings but referred to those which accompanied the provisional specification.

The same accompany

drawings may

both specifica

tions.

49 & 50 VICT.

C. 37.

Protection

of patents and designs exhibited at international exhibitions.

3. Whereas by section thirty-nine of the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, as respects patents, and by section fifty-seven of the same Act as respects designs, provision is made that the exhibition of an invention or design at an industrial or international exhibition, certified as such by the Board of Trade, shall not prejudice the rights of the inventor or proprietor thereof, subject to the conditions therein mentioned, one of which is that the exhibitor must, before exhibiting the invention, design, or article, or publishing a description of the design, give the Comptroller the prescribed notice of his intention to do so:

And whereas it is expedient to provide for the extension of the said sections to industrial and international exhibitions held out of the United Kingdom, be it therefore enacted as follows:

It shall be lawful for Her Majesty, by Order in Council, from time to time to declare that sections thirty-nine and fifty-seven of the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, or either of those sections, shall apply to any exhibition mentioned in the Order in like manner as if it were an industrial or international exhibition certified by the Board of Trade, and to provide that the exhibitor shall be relieved from the conditions, specified in the said sections, of giving notice to the Comptroller of his intention to exhibit, and shall be so relieved either absolutely or upon such terms and conditions as to Her Majesty in Council may seem fit.

PATENTS, DESIGNS, AND TRADE MARKS ACT, 1888. (51 & 52 VICT. C. 50.)

An Act to amend the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, [24th Dec., 1888.]

1883.

A.D. 1888.

WHEREAS it is expedient, &c.

Be it therefore enacted, &c.

1.—(1) After the 1st day of July, 1889, a person shall not Register of be entitled to describe himself as a patent agent, whether by patent agents. advertisement, by description on his place of business, by any

document issued by him, or otherwise, unless he is registered as

a patent agent in pursuance of this Act.

(2) The Board of Trade shall, as soon as may be after the passing of this Act, and may from time to time, make such general rules as are in the opinion of the Board required for giving effect to this section, and the provisions of section 101 of the principal Act shall apply to all rules so made as if they were made in pursuance of that section.

(3) Provided that every person who proves to the satisfaction of the Board of Trade that prior to the passing of this Act he had been bond fide practising as a patent agent shall be entitled to be registered as a patent agent in pursuance of this Act.

(4) If any person knowingly describes himself as a patent agent in contravention of this section he shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £20.

(5) In this section "patent agent" means exclusively an agent

for obtaining patents in the United Kingdom.

2. For section seven of the principal Act the following section Amendments

shall be substituted, namely:

(The substituted section is inserted ante, p. 487.)

of 46 & 47

Vict. c. 57.

S. 7, as to applications.

49 & 50 VICT.

C. 37.

Protection

of patents and designs exhibited at international exhibitions.

3. Whereas by section thirty-nine of the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, as respects patents, and by section fifty-seven of the same Act as respects designs, provision is made that the exhibition of an invention or design at an industrial or international exhibition, certified as such by the Board of Trade, shall not prejudice the rights of the inventor or proprietor thereof, subject to the conditions therein mentioned, one of which is that the exhibitor must, before exhibiting the invention, design, or article, or publishing a description of the design, give the Comptroller the prescribed notice of his intention to do so:

And whereas it is expedient to provide for the extension of the said sections to industrial and international exhibitions held out of the United Kingdom, be it therefore enacted as follows:

It shall be lawful for Her Majesty, by Order in Council, from time to time to declare that sections thirty-nine and fifty-seven of the Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, or either of those sections, shall apply to any exhibition mentioned in the Order in like manner as if it were an industrial or international exhibition certified by the Board of Trade, and to provide that the exhibitor shall be relieved from the conditions, specified in the said sections, of giving notice to the Comptroller of his intention to exhibit, and shall be so relieved either absolutely or upon such terms and conditions as to Her Majesty in Council may seem fit.