The Hon. (Dr.) Harsha de Silva

¶ 01 Hon. Deputy Speaker, I present the Report of the Committee on Public Finance on the Regulations under Section 204 read with Sections 160A, 161B, 161C, 161D, 161E, 161F, 161G, 161I, 161K and 161L of the Intellectual Property Act, No. 36 of 2003, which were referred to the said Committee.

¶ 02 Ordered to lie upon the Table.

¶ 03 Sir, the reason why the two Committees have reported on the same Regulations and are jointly presenting the Reports is that when there is a levy or some fee attached to a Regulation application, it also has to come to the Committee on Public Finance.

¶ 04 Those were on the Intellectual Property Rights for Geographical Indications, which is a good thing and will benefit the country immensely.

¶ 05 Sir, let me also make a point here. Why we did this jointly for the first time today is because of what happened in the last Parliament in the outsourcing of visas to GBS Technology Services and IVS Global-FZCO. The matter went only before the Ministerial Consultative Committee and did not come to the Committee on Public Finance. It is only subsequently that we found out that there was a big controversial tender underneath that whole transaction. But, unfortunately, nothing seems to be happening in that regard. Sir, I want to remind you that we had presented a 665-page Report, which was taken by three Members of our Committee to the Supreme Court and an injunction was obtained. But, since then, nothing seems to be happening. So, I just want to remind you, Sir, that we need to start looking into that.

¶ 06 Thank you very much.

¶ 07 Petitions