Gummow J
30.
- where the invention is a method or process – use the method or process or do any act mentioned in paragraph (a) in respect of a product resulting from such use."
Chapter 11, Pt 1 (ss 117-123) makes detailed provisions for infringement. Chapter 12 (ss 133-140) provides for compulsory licences and revocation if the reasonable requirements of the public with respect to the invention are not satisfied.
Conclusions respecting intellectual property legislation
The upshot is that (a) while the Commonwealth and supporting interveners are correct in their submissions that it would be wrong to approach the issues arising under s 51(xxxi) of the Constitution on the footing that registration under the TMA or the Designs Act, a grant under the Patents Act, or the subsistence of copyright, confers some unconstrained right to exploit those items of intellectual property or an immunity from the operation of regulatory laws, (b) that is not sufficient to dispose of the case presented for the application of s 51(xxxi).
The Packaging Act
The central provisions of the Packaging Act should now be indicated, with some reference thereafter to provisions thereof which deal with the intersection between that statute and the TMA and the Designs Act.
Chapter 3, Pt 2, Div 1 (ss 31-36) of the Packaging Act creates a range of offences, with attached criminal and civil penalties. These offences include those for selling or supplying "tobacco products" in retail packaging which does not comply with a "tobacco product requirement" (s 31), purchasing such products other than for personal use (s 32), packaging such products for retail sale (s 33), manufacturing non-compliant retail packaging of tobacco products (s 34) and manufacturing tobacco products that are so packaged (s 35). Part 2, Div 2 (ss 37-39) creates offences with attached criminal and civil penalties for selling or supplying "tobacco products" which do not comply with a "tobacco product requirement" (s 37), purchasing such products other than for personal use (s 38), and manufacturing such products (s 39).
While Pt 2 of Ch 3 fixes upon "a person", Pt 3 of Ch 3 fixes upon the activities of "constitutional corporations"[1] but otherwise follows the scheme of the offences in Pt 2.
- ↑ This term means a corporation to which s 51(xx) of the Constitution applies (s 4(1)).
