Bill C-224

An Act to amend the Food and Drugs Act (natural health products)

This enactment amends the Food and Drugs Act to provide that natural health products are not therapeutic products within the meaning of that Act and, therefore, are not subject to the same monitoring regime as other drugs.

Food and Drugs Act

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

moved that Bill C-224, An Act to amend the Food and Drugs Act (natural health products), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, it is certainly a pleasure for me to rise for the second Parliament in a row to present a bill to restore the traditional definition of natural health products.

Canadians watching at home might recall that back in the last Parliament, in 2023, the Trudeau government of the day introduced Bill C-47, the budget implementation act, which redefined natural health products. Basically, they had a stand-alone regulatory body that had its own regulations and legislation. The government of the day changed that to make natural health products regulated the same way as therapeutic drugs, which has meant that all the processes Health Canada uses to pre-approve sites and pre-approve natural health products are now the same as those for therapeutic drugs.

This has meant that getting something as simple as a vitamin B complex to the marketplace is just as complicated and potentially as convoluted as getting a new cancer treatment drug to the marketplace. Of course, the government's intention through Bill C-47's change to the definition was to do cost recovery on the natural health product industry the same way that it is done in the pharmaceutical industry. Given that big pharmaceutical industries have billions of dollars of research and development funds and have a completely regulated allopathic health care system, natural health products cannot compete in that space.

We will talk more about that red tape, but I just want to be clear with Canadians that there was no consultation at the time that Bill C-47 was brought in. As a matter of fact, there was no debate. I could not find anything the government said at the time about natural health products. They were just tucked into the massive omnibus budget implementation act. The Natural Health Products Protection Association had no idea. The Canadian Health Food Association had no idea. The Direct Sellers Association of Canada had no idea. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business did not know. This plan was hatched in a back room, where Health Canada officials, I am assuming, basically duped the minister of the day, Mark Holland, into putting this into the budget implementation act.

It created a firestorm of activity. Parliamentarians who were here in the last Parliament will remember the various campaigns that were initiated by Canadians across the country, whether it is the Natural Health Products Protection Association's campaign or the Canadian Health Food Association's “Save Our Supplements” campaign. I have a stack of cards from concerned Canadians in my office, as I think the Speaker does as well, that is at least two feet high.

Canada's Parliament is supreme in this matter, and that should not be overlooked by Health Canada officials who want to have their way all the time when Canadians are concerned. Our job as parliamentarians is to make sure that the laws and regulations thereunder reflect what Canadians' wishes are. Overwhelmingly, Parliament has been told time and time again by Canadians, whether they are involved in the business directly or are consumers, that they do not want their government to treat natural health products like they are therapeutic drugs. They want the traditional definition restored.

If we go back to 1998, there were 53 recommendations in the health committee report suggesting that natural health products be regulated, classified and categorized on their own. There was opposition when an attempt was made to change the law in 2014 by the creation of Vanessa's Law. The thought was that Health Canada could sneak health products in under the Vanessa's Law rubric.

There was push-back on that at that particular point in time, which led to massive industry consultation with Canadians. Of course, natural health products have been regulated on their own since that time in 2014-15. This actually created an opportunity, because of the consultations of the previous Harper government, for the natural health products industry to flourish and become the gold standard, or at least it was the gold standard for a number of years, until Bill C-47 was passed.

The bill in the previous Parliament was Bill C-368. It is now Bill C-224. I just want to say how important it is that Canadians understand that if the bill does not pass, Health Canada will have the power to regulate natural health products as if they are therapeutic drugs. We need to undo that. It is a cash grab by Health Canada, to basically charge the fees that it wants to charge. It was called the self-care framework for a time. This would massively increase the cost of creating a site licence and it would also massively increase the cost of getting a product to market.

Prior to Bill C-47, Canada was an icon and had the highest standard of regulations for natural health products globally. The International Alliance of Dietary/Food Supplement Associations, IADSA, in its written submission at committee on Bill C-368 in the previous Parliament, said:

Up to now, Canada has been a world leader in the regulation of dietary supplements. We fear that the proposed changes to Canada's regulatory framework for natural health products risk creating an environment that could stifle the industry and limit Canadians' access to high-quality supplements.

IADSA has always promoted the Canadian model as a global reference point for governments across the world who are creating or redeveloping their regulatory systems. This Canadian model is recognized as providing consumers access to products which are safe and beneficial while fostering innovation and supporting investment in the sector.

That is the same shape the Harper administration left the natural health products industry in. There are precisely the same challenges with the changes proposed in Bill C-47. It has undone all of that good work and created uncertainty in this environment.

Our brand is very reputable, or at least it was. For products, manufacturers and distributors across the world, if a product had a natural product number and the made-in-Canada symbol on the label, it was trusted pretty much globally. A natural health product sold around the world that was developed, processed and regulated in Canada was trusted to be safe. The contents in the bottle matched the contents on the label or matched the labelling requirements. That was our reputation, but that is not the case anymore.

The changes that have been proposed under Bill C-47 and the self-care framework are basically going to create licence fees that would stop or wipe out a lot of manufacturers. This is for traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurveda medicine, homeopathy and so on. This is very concerning because 80% of Canadians use these products.

The cost-recovery framework that was proposed would have new product fees of up to $4,000 per product. If we look at traditional Chinese medicine, the ingredients are combined to get a very select remedy for clients. If a fee had to be paid every time the ingredients were combined to make a traditional Chinese medicine product, that would make it virtually impossible for traditional Chinese medicine practitioners to be effective and sell their products at a price point that users of traditional Chinese medicine could afford. It would wipe out traditional Chinese medicine.

This would have a huge impact on our economy at a time when job numbers are not necessarily great. There are 54,000 direct employees in Canada who are working in this space. If we were to lose a wide swath of traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic medicine and all of these things, it would be a tremendous loss to our economy.

I want to be clear that this was done under the previous Trudeau administration. Gender-based analysis was a big issue for the previous administration, but when this change was imposed, there was no gender-based analysis done on the impacts of changing the traditional definition of therapeutic products in Bill C-47.

Over 80% of natural health products consumers are women, while 90% of practitioners are women. Over 50% of the micro-businesses are female- or women-owned, and 84% of direct sellers are women. That is what the impact would be on the Canadian economy if we continue down this road of making the natural health products space uncompetitive. We would lose businesses in Canada.

Let me remind people where the starting point was. We were already the best regulated environment in the world. We did not need to do any of this in Bill C-47. We were the safest already. Over 80% of Canadians use natural health products. There were several audits done by the industry, by Deloitte and so on, that basically debunked all of the claims that Health Canada was making to justify what it was doing. It claimed it was for consumer protection, but the reality is that very few people, in any way, shape or form, are harmed by natural health products.

Where are we? We have more red tape, more costs and less choice for consumers. We are also in an environment right now where, south of the border, there are several states, such as Georgia, North Carolina, Texas, South Carolina and Nevada, that are actively using tax incentives to draw health businesses into their areas of responsibility. In Canada, we have a 90-day personal use import system where anybody can order online and have their natural health products brought in from a non-Canadian jurisdiction with the same level of regulatory framework. Regulatory checks and pre-market approvals for sites and products all happen in Canada. That is why we have the gold standard when it comes to regulations.

That is not what our main competitor in the United States does at all. It has a post-market regulatory framework, which means that anybody who has a business in Canada and who is looking at the uncompetitive environment, and most of these business people are women, would be looking at the United States, saying that they could move their business down there, start manufacturing, have a tax incentive to do so and still ship to Canada. They would not have to deal with any of the burdens and red tape of pre-market approvals for a site or a product, and simply have some post-market regulations in the United States, but still ship to Canada without even any tariffs on those personal-use imports.

This is the environment we are facing here in Canada. It is one we should be very concerned about. We should be making sure that we do not overburden the Canadian space, because this market is worth $5.5 billion in products every year. That is over $200 million just in GST alone, and the cost of the natural health products directorate is only $50 million a year. This industry pays for itself in spades, and we are not even talking about the health benefits for Canadians, which keep them out of the allopathic health care system, or the regulated health care system, that we have here in Canada.

Really, it comes down to choice. Consumers want to be able to take care of themselves. Mothers want to take care of their families and their children. People are looking for alternative health care measures all of the time when the regular health care system is not providing them any relief.

Anybody who says that Health Canada does not have enough power right now is simply missing the point. As a matter of fact, the Auditor General has said that Health Canada was not already using the powers it had pre-Bill C-47. With its current powers, it can stop the sale of any natural health product it wants.

Health Canada has border powers for personal-use imports. If it chooses to change the regulations or do more to keep Canadians safe from health products that are coming in from offshore, it can do so. It can seize any product any time it wants. It can revoke a site licence from a manufacturer, a packager, a labeller or an importer any time it wants. It can mandate a label change, for example, to add a warning, to any of the manufacturers here in Canada. It can inspect any place that has a site licence any time it wants. It has already done so. It is called good manufacturing practices. It has that ability to do so. It can inspect any product off the shelf by sending it to a lab, doing an analysis and making sure the contents in the bottle match the contents on the label. It can revoke a natural product number.

These are the massive, sweeping powers that Health Canada already had prior to Bill C-47, so the arguments that Health Canada is using, that it needs massive new powers to keep Canadians safe, simply do not hold water.

I also want to expand on the fact that health products are now being regulated as therapeutic products, so the fine structures for therapeutic products now apply to health products. Some of these fines can be up to $5 million a day for non-compliance. This makes sense for a large global therapeutic or biomedical company, but it does not make sense for a mom-and-pop shop that is trying to create some new natural remedies or a practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine.

This is a ridiculous change that simply did not need to happen. It puts a chill in the industry and a chill in investment. Nobody wants to operate or take any risks in that particular structure.

In closing, I want to thank Canadians from coast to coast who have written to parliamentarians and who have put pressure on their MPs. I will just advise them that they need to continue to do that because there will be a vote on this. I know that we need to make the changes to get natural health products back to their traditional definition and classification. We need colleagues to get this bill to committee so that we can go through it again.

I urge everybody to listen to Canadians. It is time to have some true consultation on this process. I want to thank all of the industry association reps, Natural Health Product Protection Association, the Canadian Health Food Association and everybody else who has lobbied so hard to protect these vital, important businesses and this vital, important space for Canadians.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, I am a little disappointed in the member opposite because I do not think he is being fully transparent about the issue.

There are many Canadians who have a genuine concern about the issue of contamination. Does the member believe that there are no concerns related to contamination and that Canadians have nothing to be concerned about with this issue? After all, we have seen Health Canada issue recalls in certain situations. Does the member believe Health Canada plays no role in this? To what degree does the member see the value of providing Canadians assurances through Health Canada that the products they are consuming are safe?

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Madam Speaker, I guess I reject the premise of the question. I never said that Health Canada did not have a role to play.

As a matter of fact, had the member been listening to my speech, he would have heard me say that Health Canada, prior to Bill C-47, had the power to stop any sale of any natural health product that is regulated in this country. That product cannot be sold as a natural health product until it has a natural product number, which means that natural health products have to be pre-approved. Nothing can happen post-market access. Everything is approved before it even gets to the market.

Health Canada has border powers for personal-use imports. It has seizure powers to seize a product that it thinks might be unsafe. It can revoke a site licence for a manufacturer, a packager, a labeller or an importer. It can mandate any label change if it is concerned about the contents inside the bottle not matching what is on the label. It can inspect any site to look for contamination issues all it wants. It can even stop that site from continuing to produce things.

The hon. member's question seems to indicate that there are no authorities and powers right now, but nothing could be further from the truth.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Madam Speaker, I wish I could say that Bill C-224 is basically the same as Bill C-368, which was scrapped when the election was called. The Bloc Québécois had made amendments to Bill C‑368 to strike a balance between people's concern for their safety and the need to avoid destroying an industry.

Could my colleague give me a clear answer this morning about whether he will support our amendments, like he did the last time when all the parties agreed to our amendments?

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his support of the bill in the last Parliament and for his thoughtful analysis. The member was very thoughtful in his deliberations and his approach to dealing with Bill C-368. He will note that the bill is not exactly the same. One of the amendments that was put forward at the committee stage the last time dealt with exempting nicotine, so I included that through the definition in this particular bill, but there are other amendments that my colleague would likely bring back to the committee.

The member does not need my permission to do that, so I would encourage my colleague to actually talk to the industry associations and Canadians who might have had some concerns with the amendments that he brought forward, and make sure he gets them on side.

At this particular point, the bill that I have tabled before the House belongs to the House. I want to get it passed here at second reading, and the place for those amendments to be proposed is at committee, but the member does not need my permission to do it. He should ask Canadians and the industry associations that represent them whether they agree with the wording and the nuances of the wording that were in those amendments. In principle, I support the amendments that he put forward in the last Parliament.

[Rob Morrison, Conservative, Columbia—Kootenay—Southern Rockies, BC]

Madam Speaker, I presented petition e-4474 on this matter, with 15,000 signatures from across Canada of individuals who were concerned with the new changes to natural health products. These changes would really impact a lot of our small and medium-sized businesses that provide natural health products. In Columbia—Kootenay—Southern Rockies, we have areas where a lot of people are proactive with their health care and are using natural health products.

The member gave an awesome presentation of the bill. I think we are going to have success with this across Canada.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the comments from my colleague, and I thank him and all my colleagues here in the Conservative benches for the support of the bill. I want to thank my colleagues from the NDP, Green Party and the Bloc Québécois who supported the bill in the last Parliament, and I look forward to their continued support and their constructive feedback.

I am also looking forward to making sure that we get back to the traditional definition of natural health products. That is what Canadians want. That is what they elected us to do. Let us do it.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, before I get to the debate on Bill C-224, I just want to make quick reference to something that embodies a great deal of national pride from coast to coast to coast here in Canada: the Grey Cup.

We had a wonderful celebration in the city of Winnipeg, hosting the Montreal Alouettes along with the Saskatchewan Roughriders. Canadians were entertained by a first-class football game. I know that my colleague and good friend from northern Saskatchewan is a big Riders fan and was very pleased with the outcome, but I think it is safe to say that all football fans got to be entertained with a first-class Canadian football game.

We congratulate the city of Winnipeg, the residents and the organizers, from the commissioner all the way down to the volunteers, on having a very successful 112th Grey Cup, and we look forward to Grey Cup 2026, which I think will stay in the Prairies. I believe it will go to Calgary, followed by Regina.

I just wanted to acknowledge that right at the get-go.

I appreciate what the member is trying to bring forward in the form of a private member's bill. When I think of natural health products, I think of two aspects. One is the consumer, and there is absolutely no doubt that Canadians all over our country actually participate in the consumption of natural health products. They are very widely used. I have visited stores to look at ways I can improve my health. At age 63, maybe it is more of an interest; I am not 100% sure, but I do see the value of natural health products, and I also recognize the size and magnitude of the industry.

It is an industry that has provided jobs for Canadians. It has provided all sorts of opportunities for Canadians. I do not question the value of that industry, and hopefully it will continue to grow. I do not think there is anyone within the Liberal caucus who wants to prevent the industry from growing. The more growth we see within that industry, quite frankly, the better it is, but I also believe at the same time that the Conservatives need to take into consideration the well-being, health and safety of Canadians in general, because not all items they are referencing are actually produced here in Canada.

I take a great sense of pride in the work that Health Canada does for our nation. On a wide variety of products, it plays an incredibly important role. In some areas, I do believe there is an opportunity and in fact a need for us to actually look at ways in which Health Canada might even be able to strengthen our industry. Having more oversight is ultimately good for the industry, and when I reflect on Bill C-47, what I see is legislation that ensured that there would be more oversight of an industry that is really important to Canada.

When we talk about how we can grow our economy, we often talk about the benefits of being able to export. The member made reference to the importance of the maple leaf, and I agree with him on that part. A government-sanctioned maple leaf on a product carries a great deal of weight, not only here in Canada but also beyond our borders, and that is something we collectively should want to protect to ensure that its value is always held to the nth degree.

Among the industries around the world, we find the pharmaceutical and natural health product industries. The potential for growth in those industries is tremendous, and that is why I understand that there is some resistance even from within, in terms of Health Canada and the oversight issue. However, I truly believe that Health Canada's providing additional oversight, which was enabled through Bill C-47, puts Canada once again on a higher platform for us to be able to export products, and I am very much interested in exports because I believe that the market potential is great.

About a year ago, I was in the Philippines at a grocery store that was unique in that it was profiling Canadian products. It was quite encouraging to see the number of Canadian products being sold in Manila at a grocery store. When I was talking with the manager of the grocery store, he indicated that they could not get enough of the products coming from Canada, because the products from Canada were being so well received.

This is the type of thing that, I believe, we undersell, and I think there is so much more potential, and that is the reason the Prime Minister of Canada is today looking to the export markets of Asia and Europe, going beyond the United States border, which I see as a positive thing. When we think in terms of the natural health products and the industry we have here in Canada, there is a great deal of merit in asking whether there is a role that Health Canada plays, through the branding of our maple leaf, to actually advance the industry. I believe the answer to that is yes, which is why Bill C-47 had an important role.

I pose this question to the member opposite: What about the consumer? We know for a fact that Health Canada has issued recalls on some items that have been tainted. To what degree would the member be prepared to answer on that specific issue? I would argue that with the additional oversight, ultimately issues of recall, or contamination, if I can put it that way, would not happen, and we would be able to provide the consumer with much more of a guarantee for the product they are consuming.

More and more what I have found, especially in our younger generation, is that people are looking at ways to stay healthy. They are looking at options, which is something that again speaks positively about an industry we are all concerned about. If we can reinforce confidence by having Health Canada provide extra oversight, I see that as a positive thing, and it is what we should be looking at in the legislation. How would the legislation reinforce confidence in natural health products? If anything, I would argue, it would take away from the level of confidence.

There is a responsibility for the official opposition to be more transparent. Yes, of course there are some things Health Canada can do, just like the Canada Border Services Agency can do some things. We recognize that, but I would suggest that members opposite also need to recognize that this is a very real issue and that the opportunities within the industry can in fact be enhanced by having more oversight.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Madam Speaker, rarely have I heard a speech showing such ignorance about an issue and a bill.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau]

It is embarrassing.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is really embarrassing. Obviously, the member has not read the natural health products regulations. The member said that Bill C-47 gives more powers, when all of that is already set out in the regulations, which are quite lengthy. I read them all so that I could introduce the amendments that I mentioned earlier.

The member clearly also did not read the Food and Drugs Act or Vanessa's Law. Had he read those pieces of legislation, he would not have given the speech that he just gave. He made sweeping generalizations about how we want to promote an irresponsible industry.

Will the member apologize for not being able to give a speech that addresses the problem? He should have remained seated rather than standing up and spouting nonsense.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

This is not a question and comment period. We have resumed debate.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Madam Speaker, that is the second time that has happened to me.

I know I need to calm down, but speeches like that make no sense. I worked full-time for over two weeks with legal experts to come up with three small amendments. The member for Ponoka—Didsbury made it clear that the first amendment has been incorporated into Bill C‑224, but there were two others. These two other amendments addressed the concerns raised by some stakeholders, particularly Health Canada.

Do members know what the Auditor General's report revealed? It revealed that, since 2014, Health Canada has been unable to enforce its natural health products regulations. That is what it revealed. The Auditor General analyzed 75 of the industry's 91,000 natural health products. The Auditor General knew that these 75 products were already problematic and wanted to be able to tell Health Canada to do its job. In a panic, Health Canada decided to use an omnibus bill to introduce Bill C‑47 in an appendix. This bill purportedly championed consumer safety, but it threatened to kill an industry.

Consumers must be able to make free and informed choices, but there must be products available for them to make free and informed choices about. When we talk about natural health products, we are not talking about large multinationals. We are talking about small and medium-sized businesses.

Having cost-recovery provisions that allow the work to get done properly is not a problem. The problem is that Health Canada went for the simplest solution possible. It took the cost recovery and penalties model that it uses for pharmaceuticals and applied it to natural health products. Need I remind the House that the pharmaceutical industry has 20-year patents? The same cannot be said of the natural health products industry. Need I also remind the House that there are no taxes on pharmaceutical products, unlike natural health products? The government takes in enough money to pay for a proper oversight system.

This is what shocks me the most. I did my job, and I have kept in touch with all the groups. The industry is not at all resistant to change. What it wants is a system that allows it to survive over the long term. However, it also wants to rid its system of bad actors. The natural health products regulations were supposed to be ironclad.

We decided that we needed to go a step further. First, nicotine must be kept within the therapeutic products category. All nicotine-based products are therapies for quitting smoking. Nicotine is a highly addictive drug. That is what we did with the first amendment. That was also what the government and the minister at the time wanted. We presented that.

In the second Bloc Québécois amendment, we ensured that the minister would have the power to order a recall, even though he has all the powers under the regulations. Need I remind members that recalls were voluntary? There have never been any alarming cases of people being resistant to recalls. We protected the minister's right to order recalls, which was already provided for under the regulations.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would ask members on the other side to please take their conversations to the lobby.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

I would like to ask hon. members not to have conversations while someone else is giving a speech.

The hon. member for Montcalm may continue his speech.