Industrial and Commercial Property (Protection) Act, 1927

Ministers may acquire designs.

77.—(1) It shall be lawful for any Minister to acquire by purchase or otherwise from the proprietor of a design (whether registered in Saorstát Eireann or elsewhere or unregistered) and it shall be lawful for such proprietor to sell or otherwise alienate to such Minister, such design or any right, liberty, or privilege in relation thereto upon such terms as may be agreed upon between the Minister and the proprietor and be sanctioned by the Minister for Finance.

(2) Any Minister may procure the registration (subject to the provisions of this Act) of any design acquired by or vested in him under this section or otherwise in the appropriate register established under this Act, and may procure the registration of any such design in any register maintained in any place outside Saorstát Eireann if and so far as and subject to such conditions as such registration is permitted by the law regulating such register, and in any such case may procure himself to be entered as the proprietor of any design so registered.

(3) It shall be lawful for a Minister to grant to any person a licence to use and apply to any goods any design of which such Minister shall be the registered proprietor and to charge such fees as shall be sanctioned by the Minister for Finance for such licences.

(4) Every licence granted by a Minister under the foregoing sub-section may contain provisions ensuring that the design to which such licence relates shall be applied by the licensee only to goods grown, manufactured, or produced in Saorstát Eireann, and any such licence may also contain such provisions, conditions, and restrictions as the Minister may think proper for ensuring that the design to which such licence relates shall only be applied by the licensee to goods of a specified quality or description.

(5) A Minister may at any time take such lawful steps, whether by action, or prosecution at law or otherwise, as he shall think proper to restrain or punish infringements of or otherwise to protect the copyright in any design of which he shall be the registered proprietor under this section, and may take such steps in Saorstát Eireann or in any other country or place in which he shall be so registered.

(6) In this section the word “Minister” means a Minister head of a Department of State established under the Ministers and Secretaries Act, 1924 (No. 16 of 1924).