EventReader error with empty Filter

Symptom

The error message is found in the netcool.log file only and is of the format:

WARN [EventFilter] EventFilter.getMatchingPoliciesForEvent: Could not parse the Expression:
java.lang.RuntimeException:
com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.ParseException: Encountered ";" at line 1, column 10.
Was expecting one of:
<INTEGER_LITERAL> ...
<FLOAT_LITERAL> ...
<DATETIME_LITERAL> ...
<DATE_LITERAL> ...
"-" ...
"~" ...
"!" ...
"(" ...
"{" ...
"@" ...
"true" ...
"false" ...
<IDENTIFIER> ...
"\"" ...
"\'" ...

at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.IPLPolicy.getNode(IPLPolicy.java:106)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.IPLPolicy.execute(IPLPolicy.java:54)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.PolicyUtils.parse(PolicyUtils.java:96)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.PolicyUtils.parse(PolicyUtils.java:114)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.PolicyUtils.parseExpression(PolicyUtils.java:197)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.PolicyUtils.testExpression(PolicyUtils.java:350)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.PolicyUtils.testExpression(PolicyUtils.java:344)
at com.micromuse.response.event.EventFilter.getMatchingPoliciesForEvent(EventFilter.java:271)
at com.micromuse.response.service.AbstractEventReader.run(AbstractEventReader.java:524)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:736)
Caused by: com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.ParseException:
Encountered ";" at line 1, column 10.
Was expecting one of:
<INTEGER_LITERAL> ...
<FLOAT_LITERAL> ...
<DATETIME_LITERAL> ...
<DATE_LITERAL> ...
"-" ...
"~" ...
"!" ...
"(" ...
"{" ...
"@" ...
"true" ...
"false" ...
<IDENTIFIER> ...
"\"" ...
"\'" ...

at java.lang.Throwable.<init>(Throwable.java:67)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.ParseException.<init>(ParseException.java:32)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.generateParseException(PolicyParser.java:2831)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.jj_consume_token(PolicyParser.java:2746)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.UnaryExpression(PolicyParser.java:1391)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.InExpression(PolicyParser.java:1215)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.RegularExpression(PolicyParser.java:1139)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.MultiplicativeExpression(PolicyParser.java:1035)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.AdditiveExpression(PolicyParser.java:959)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.RelationalExpression(PolicyParser.java:827)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.EqualityExpression(PolicyParser.java:725)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.AndExpression(PolicyParser.java:685)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.ExclusiveOrExpression(PolicyParser.java:645)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.InclusiveOrExpression(PolicyParser.java:605)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.ConditionalAndExpression(PolicyParser.java:553)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.ConditionalOrExpression(PolicyParser.java:512)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.Expression(PolicyParser.java:476)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.Assignment(PolicyParser.java:488)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.StatementExpression(PolicyParser.java:2376)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.Statement(PolicyParser.java:2263)
at com.micromuse.common.parser.internal.core.PolicyParser.CompilationUnit(PolicyParser.java:113)
at com.micromuse.response.common.parser.IPLPolicy.getNode(IPLPolicy.java:99)
... 9 more