Dr Stjerna, who filed in the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany (Bundesverfassungsgericht, BVerfG) the complaint against the legislation enabling Germany to ratify the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court (UPC), has published here an update, reporting which parties the BVerfG invited or allowed to comment, and which of those did so. Regarding those who commented, the only difference from what has previously been reported (here) is that the Bundestag (German parliament) was one of those (and that its deadline was extended from 31 December 2017 to 31 January 2018). One of the complainant’s allegations concerns the Bundestag’s approval of the draft legislation; he claims a breach of a constitutional law requirement that adoption of legislation amounting to a transfer of sovereign powers to European institutions must be decided by a qualified majority of two thirds of the members of the Bundestag and the Bundesrat (Federal Council) (see here).  The other organisations filing statements were the German Federal government, BRAK (Bundesrechtsanwaltskammer, Federal Bar Association), DAV (DeutscherAnwaltVerein, German Bar Association), GRUR (Deutsche Vereinigung für gewerblichen Rechtsschutz und Urheberrecht, German Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property), EPLAW (European Patent Lawyers Association), EPLIT (European Patent Litigators Association) and the EPO (European Patent Office).

As reported here, the complaint is included in the BVerfG’s 2018 case list.