My honourable friend the Minister of State for Science and Innovation (Malcolm Wicks) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.

I have tasked the UK Intellectual Property Office with managing and shaping an intellectual property system which encourages innovation and creativity, balances the needs of rights holders and the public, promotes strong and competitive markets and provides a firm foundation for the knowledge-based economy.

I have set the UK Intellectual Property Office a broader range of targets for 2007-08 based on a balanced scorecard approach. These targets are:

Customers and Stakeholders

issue 90 per cent of patent search reports within four months of request;

grant 90 per cent of patents within two and a half years of request;

to register 90 per cent of processed trade mark applications, to which no substantive objections have been raised or oppositions filed, within eight months of application;

to examine 95 per cent of all design applications within three months;

to resolve 55 per cent of trade mark disputes in one year^*;

to receive an overall “good” or “satisfactory” rating in at least 80 per cent of responses in customer and ministerial surveys;

the number of businesses taking action to improve the management of their IP will increase by 20 per cent above baseline in targeted groups;

meet 80 per cent of agreed milestones in development of policy initiatives;

generate a 10 per cent increase in demand for non-statutory innovation support services; and

develop six target profiles, using Telpat intelligence.

Finance

achieve the target of 4 per cent on return on capital employed; and

reduce total current expenditure on the operations of the trading fund compared with the baseline of the corporate plan 2004-05, in line with the DTI's published efficiency technical note. Cumulative savings target for 2005-06, 2006-07 and 2007-08 is £2.7 million.

Internal Processes

achieve positive outcomes on 100 per cent of ISO and charter mark health checks;

make the correct decision on registerability in at least 98.5 per cent of trade mark applications;

give good customer service in patent search and examination in 95 per cent of quality assured cases;

reduce number of days sick absence per person to: nine days by March 2008, eight and a half days by March 2009 and eight days by March 2010;

complete, sign off and return 100 per cent of performance measurement forms to personnel by 31 May 2008: 95 per cent by 31 May 2007 and 100 per cent by 31 May 2008;

to achieve 99 per cent or more of the agreed monthly service levels for key IT systems;

80 per cent or more of internal customers are “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with the provision of internal IT customer services; and

apply for initial assessment of our environmental management system by the ISO accreditation body by the end of March 2008.

Change and Development

achieve a minimum of 75 per cent “no actions required” recommendations in follow up internal audit reports where initial recommendations were “necessary actions required” or “urgent actions required”;

80 per cent of completed TREFs to contain positive feedback from line manager on the improved competences of staff;

to achieve 80 per cent or more of agreed milestones for key projects within the reporting year; and

ensure that applications from black and minority ethnic people are running at 5 per cent of applications for A-B1 level posts by end March 2008.

*this target is intended to have a second element “to have disposed of at least 98 per cent of disputes within three years, from the third year of this target, ie 2008-09”