Thank you, Chair.
To review this particular amendment, the legislation says, if you turn to page 3, at proposed subsection 4(2), that “Plant breeder’s rights may be granted in respect of a plant variety if it”, and then it defines four critical, essential characteristics. It has to be a new variety. It has to be distinguishable, which would be distinct. It has to be stable. It has to be homogenous. This wording is very much in line with UPOV 91.
The NDP amendment is changing the definition of “new”. Although distinctness is already part of this definition, the amendment is going back up to “new” and changing the definition of “new” to be “new and distinct”, so it's not necessary in that sense. The distinguishability or the distinctness of a variety is already covered under proposed paragraph 4(2)(b). Inserting it into proposed paragraph 4(2)(a) is clearly not required.
I also go back to the comment I made on the previous amendment, which is that the wording in the legislation right now aligns with UPOV 91. We can't agree to UPOV 91 if we're going to change UPOV 91, because then what we are agreeing to is different from UPOV 91. Unfortunately, this amendment falls into that category, whereby these four characteristics are accepted by other countries that also have signed on to UPOV 91, and it would be very problematic to change it.
Also, as I mentioned before, it's already been covered under proposed paragraph 4(2)(b).