Legal Bibliography: Legislation

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Copyright Act: Copyright applies to all original literary, artistic, dramatic and musical works, including computer programs, and gives the creator the sole right to produce or reproduce a work or a substantial part of it in any form. Copyright also protects performances and sound recordings. Generally, copyright protection lasts for the life of the author plus fifty years. The term of protection for performances and sound recordings is fifty years. In accordance with the Copyright Act, the Copyright Board certifies tariffs which set out the royalties payable in respect of certain uses of copyright subject matter.

Bill C-48: On December 12, 2001, the Government tabled a bill to amend Section 31 of the Copyright Act. Bill C-48 clarifies that existing distribution systems, such as cable and satellite, may continue to redistribute over-the-air television and radio signals. It also creates a regulation making power which will allow the Government to establish conditions under which new entrants, such as Internet-based retransmitters and any other currently unforeseen-technology-based retransmitters, can qualify for the compulsory redistribution license.

Industrial Design Act: An industrial design is granted for the shape, pattern or ornamentation applied to a useful article that is mass-produced. Registration enables industrial designers to prevent others from making, using, renting or selling their design in Canada for up to ten years.

Integrated Circuit Topography Act: Integrated circuit topographies refer to the three-dimensional configurations of the materials that form integrated circuits. The Act provides for ten years of protection which enables the registered owner to exclude others from reproducing the topography and importing or using it in manufactured products.

Patent Act: Patents are granted for inventions which must be novel (first in the world), useful (functional and operative) and non-obvious to someone skilled in the art (inventive ingenuity). A patent gives the inventor the right to exclude others from making, using, or selling their invention for twenty years from the date of filing the patent application.

Patent Medicine Prices Review Board Regulations: Regulations specifying the information to be provided relating to patented medicines and patentees' revenues and research and development expenditures.

December 28, 2007ml">Plant Breeders' Rights Act and Plant Breeders' Rights Regulations: The Plant Breeders' Rights Office administers the Plant Breeders' Rights Act (1990) and Regulations which provide legal protection to plant breeders for new plant varieties for up to 18 years.

Trade-marks Act: A trade-mark is a word, symbol, design, or a combination of these, used to distinguish the wares or services of one person or organization from those of others in the marketplace. Trade-mark registration gives one the exclusive right to use the mark across Canada for fifteen years, renewable every fifteen years thereafter.

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Patent Act, R.S.C. 1985, P-4

online full text at Department of Justice Canada. Consolidated Statutes of Canada

Regulations

Online text of regulations at Consolidated Regulations of Canada

Patent Rules - at Consolidated Regulations of Canada

*Warning! The Patent Act has been amended numerous times. To update legislation, check Canada Legislative Digest. Look up the act in the title index to obtain information on new bill numbers. To find our whether bills were in forced (i.e. became law), look up the pages containing information about bills. Check the proclamations section to update in force statutes of legislation.

Canada Statute Service on CD-ROM. Aurora, ON: Canada Law Book, 1994-current.

Consolidated Intellectual Property Statutes and Regulations 2000. Scarborough, ON: Carswell, 1999. Among various information on intellectual property, includes Patent Act.