I read a column today recommending that Australians ride out the Trump presidency by having a laugh at America’s expense – ‘we must’, the author extols us, ‘make sport of her in this high season of her weirdness, this peak of her fever, this pomp of her lunacy.’ Who knows, maybe this is good advice. But it does have one major failing: right now Australian politics is itself hardly a bastion of seriousness and sanity. And of all the buffoons and bloviators propelled into parliamentary prominence by last year’s farcical federal election, there is arguably none more compellingly attention-catching that ex-One Nation Western Australian senator (or, quite probably, ex-senator, unless you are asking him) Rodney Norman Culleton – a man whose submissions at a Federal Court bankruptcy hearing have been described by the Chief Justice of the court as ‘unfocused’ and ‘bombastic’.It would be impossible to compress the continuous carnival that is Rod Culleton’s political career into an entire article, let alone a single paragraph. But for the benefit of my international readers, I will do my best. Culleton was propelled into the Senate at the election of 2 July 2016, grabbing the 11th (of 12) Western Australian seats despite receiving only 0.52% of the primary vote – of which the bulk (0.5%) was for One Nation as a party, rather than for Culleton personally – thanks to a byzantine cascade of preferences. He succeeded despite (or because of) new voting rules that were intended to prevent minor candidates from getting elected off the back of byzantine cascades of preferences. Even so, the legitimacy of his candidacy fell under a cloud, on account of the fact that he had been convicted of theft. The conviction was subsequently quashed, but this does not alter the fact that at the time of voting he would have been barred from being elected under s 44(ii) of the Constitution. With the High Court still considering that particular conundrum, Culleton then resigned from the One Nation party (the source of 96% of his primary vote), before being declared bankrupt by the Federal Court (just in time for Christmas), disqualifying him from remaining in parliament under s 44(iii) of the Constitution. The bankruptcy orders were stayed, to give him time to appeal, but in the meantime his Senate seat was officially declared vacant. Not that Culleton is fazed by such trivial setbacks – the official parliamentary website may have him listed as ‘Former Senator Rod Culleton (Independent)’, but the man himself has shown a marked preference for the ‘alternative fact’ that he is ‘still a senator’. Through all of this, Culleton has become renowned for his ability make absolutely no sense whatsoever, and to become involved in physical altercations at the most inopportune moments.
And that is all in under six months. So, aside from the fact that you would have to laugh, otherwise you would cry for the demise of Australian democracy, you might be wondering what any of this has got to do with the usual subject matter of this blog. Well, as the former senator’s parliamentary web page states, Culleton’s qualifications and occupation before entering Federal Parliament include ‘business entrepreneur in farming, manufacturing, inventor and transport/logistics’, while his sole listed publication is ‘”Storage Bin”, 2015202345, Australian Divisional Patents, IP Australia, 2004’. This connection came to my attention when I read that Culleton has accused former Wesfarmers director Dick Lester, who brought the proceedings to have Culleton declared bankrupt, of ‘abusing the bankruptcy process to get hold of Culleton’s Australian Keg Company patent in lieu of payment “to obtain what he wouldn’t otherwise have got”.’
Indeed, not only is Culleton an inventor, but one of his patents has even been successfully enforced after the infringer attempted to sue the Australian Keg Company for making unjustified threats of patent infringement. I wrote briefly about that decision here, back in January 2014. This is of some interest, because of course the overwhelming majority of patents are never litigated. Yet Culleton appears to be a man drawn to the courts as inexorably as a moth to a flame!
Tags: Australia, Infringement, Patent litigation, Politics
There are people who seem to believe that ‘inventing’ is some kind of get-rich-quick scheme – come up with an idea, slap a patent on it, and then wait for the untold millions to (magically) come rolling in. A logical corollary to this belief is that if somebody acquires an idea from such a person, and subsequently incorporates the idea into a patent application, then they have clearly deprived the originator of their rightful fortune! And, of course, the way to deal with such a situation is by spending, collectively, a few hundred thousand dollars disputing ownership of the patent application firstly in a state Supreme Court and then before a Full Bench of the Federal Court of Australia.
If you are the client of a patent attorney, you probably expect that your experienced (and, perhaps, expensive) professional adviser is keeping up-to-date with the latest developments in their chosen field. Indeed, in many professions some form of continuing professional education (CPE) – alternatively known as continuing professional development (CPD) – is not just an expectation, it is a mandatory requirement.
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