Pirates in the UK

telegraph

Statement:

The Pirate Party UK are proud to announce that they have completed the Electoral Commission's party registration process, and are now officially recognised as a British political party.

The Pirate Party UK is are now accepting memberships, and will be fielding candidates in the next General Election.

The party will campaign on a platform of copyright and patent reform, setting limits on surveillance of the public and increasing our freedom of speech.

The Party wants to legalise non-commercial filesharing, reduce the term of copyright from the current life plus 70 years, and abolish patents on drugs.
Pirate Party leader Andrew Robinson says "The Pirate Party offers an alternative to the last century's struggles between political left and political right. When a government plans to brand 7 million British filesharers as criminals, to profile every citizen, to track our movements, register every email we send and every website we visit, and to carry on allowing big business to lock up life saving drugs and environmentally beneficial technologies under an ever-growing mountain of patents, Britain desperately needs a party that fights back. We know these laws can be hanged, must be changed and will be changed."

Notes for Editors:

The Pirate Party UK is the sister party to well established Pirate Parties in Sweden and Germany. In the last European elections, Swedish voters elected the first Pirate Party MEP. The German Pirate Party has an MP in the Bundestag and is an officially recognized party eligible for state funding.
Pirate parties also exist, or are in the process of formation in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg , The Netherlands, New Zealand, orway, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, Ukraine and The United States.