George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

On 3 May this year the Coordination Committee of the World Intellectual Property Organisation nominated Dr Francis Gurry, an Australian, to become the next Director-General of WIPO. The nomination awaits formal appointment by the WIPO general assembly at its next meeting in late September. On behalf of the opposition, I want to offer our congratulations to Dr Gurry, a very illustrious Australian intellectual property lawyer, on this prestigious international appointment—although, I must say, sadly, the circumstances giving rise to the need to make this appointment have been somewhat regrettable.

The vacancy in the presidency of WIPO arose with the resignation from that office last November of the pre-existing president Kamil Idris, a Sudanese national, in circumstances of great scandal. It was revealed that Mr Idris had been forced to resign as Director-General of the World Intellectual Property Organisation because of significant fraud in his credentials. Among other things, it was revealed that Idris had misstated his age by some nine years—not something that anyone in this chamber would be guilty of, Senator Faulkner.