The Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property is one of the most significant IP treaties. One of the major features of the treaty, of course, is that it makes provision for priority claims.
The UK recently ratified the Paris Convention on behalf of the islands of Jersey and Guernsey – although the ratification occurred on 13 August 2020, it only officially comes into force on 13 November 2020. From a practical point of view the ratification will have limited effect. The reasons are as follows:
Patents
In both Jersey and Guernsey patent protection simply involves re-registration of a UK registration. The issue of priority therefore does not arise.
Trade Marks
In Jersey trade mark protection involves re-registration of a UK registration so the issue does not arise.
In Guernsey there is an independent registration system and this already recognises priority claims. The one change is that the ratification will validate priority claims made elsewhere on the basis of Guernsey filings.
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