WELCOME AND INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

Professor Sir Robin Jacob In about 1968, I was the second junior in a case of contempt of court where the defendant's defence was that he didn't realise that his Irish mistress was the same woman as his English mistress. Unbelievably, it succeeded at first instance, in the days when we had a judge who was monumentally stupid called Lloyd-Jacob (no relation).

Sitting in the front of the court, reporting it, as young barristers who had no work used to do in those days, was a young, black-haired, diligent young chap. I talk to him from time to time about this case. He was in a set of chambers – the head of which was the son of an undertaker from Peckham – and they started falling apart. Our chambers had nearly fallen apart but hadn't quite. We thought that we could strengthen our chambers by getting the only one who was any good. It was my job to go and get him. It worked, and that's why you ‘re all here now.

I’ m very pleased that Michael has agreed to give this lecture. He's promised me that it will be part stand-up comic and part serious, and it will be your job to tell which is which. I’ m going to say no more. One of my oldest and dearest friends – Michael Fysh.

LECTURE

INTRODUCTION

Thank you very much Robin. Thank you so much. I am going to deliver this sitting down. Never, as Churchill said, stand up if you can sit down, never sit down if you can lie down. Well, I shan’ t be doing that this evening. I called this talk ‘Apologia Pro Vita Sua: A HiFi Retrospective and a Modest Prospective’ – but it might well be called ‘ How Things Have Changed!’

I would first like to thank UCL's Institute of Brand and Innovation Law, and Professor Jacob in particular, for inviting me to deliver this lecture. It is a great honour. The question arose as to what I might talk about. Coming immediately to mind were possible topical IP matters such as Brexit and the UPC, Actavis v Lilly and so on, so I did some research to see what other topics were just now interesting the IP world.