Madam Chair, I appreciate this amendment, which follows through on the government's commitment to ensure that Bill C-6 doesn't have implications for natural products. I did want to just raise a concern around the general field, because there are few opportunities to do so.
We've all been hearing recently from representatives of the Canadian Health Food Association expressing concern about the backlog. We had been told that the backlog was being dealt with. Our understanding, based on meetings today, is that this is not the case. In fact, if the backlog is being dealt with at all, it is because products are being denied that request and applications are being turned down. We understand that there has been little effort on the part of the department to ensure that industry and NHP are working together to make sure there are some common understandings about safety and efficacy standards and to expedite natural health products as much as possible.
So I would like, Madam Chair, some indication from the parliamentary secretary that we might have a report to the committee or some follow-up to those concerns. Even though we're passing this amendment and we appreciate the work that has been done to get us here, we know there are big concerns that should be dealt with. We've got to find a way, especially with the stated deadline of 2010, which is causing enormous concern in the industry. I think their feeling is that we need to actually get rid of that deadline, or find a process to accelerate the approval process, or find some way to begin to expedite things in a meaningful way. We need to deal with the very serious concerns that both the industry and the people who are using natural health products are raising.
