§ 40. Captain WRIGHTasked the Minister of Munitions whether it is the practice of the Ministry to insist upon inventors who desire to submit their inventions and processes for approval and use in the national interest not only to furnish all information as to cost and construction to the Ministry but also to deposit the most detailed working drawings; whether engineers and others attached to the Ministry, whose official duty it is to examine into these inventions and processes, are allowed by the heads of Departments at the Ministry at the same time to try and design similar inventions and processes which might or might not prove more suitable and to apply for patents in their own names; whether many of these officials have been, and will again in normal times be, rivals and competitors of the inventors, being only temporarily employed by the Ministry; and, if so, whether he will explain how these practices tend to encourage submission to the Ministry of inventions and processes which might prove of great value to the nation?
§ Mr. KELLAWAYInventors are not required by the Inventions Department to furnish detailed information of the kind indicated, but if they do so the manufacture and consequent trial is facilitated. As regards the second part of the question, it is the duty of all, whether officers of the Department or not, to point out any improvement possible in the invention that may be of value to the country. No patent is taken out by any individual attached to the Inventions Department. Any individual in another Department of the Ministry may be allowed to apply for a patent subject to the permission of the head of that Department, which permission is only unrestrictedly given when the invention is of no interest to the Government nor based upon information supplied to the Department confidentially. The answer to the third part would probably be in the affirmative in regard to some officials. There is no reason to believe that the present procedure discourages the submission of inventions of value to the nation.
§ Captain WRIGHTMay I put before the hon. and gallant Member information which will show him that there is a great 1039 reluctance on the part of inventors to submit their inventions to the Ministry of Munitions?
§ Mr. KELLAWAYI shall be glad to consider any information which the hon. and gallant Member can supply.