As you may know, I've been critical of the provisions in the trans-Pacific partnership around copyright and of some of the patent provisions that we see in CETA. Part of it stems from the fact that the bargain we've been sold in some of these areas simply hasn't sorted out.
Take pharmaceuticals: almost two decades ago, Canada instituted changes in our patent rules to increase our level of patent protection in return for clear commitment in terms the amount of R and D that the large pharmaceutical companies would be making in Canada to try to address some of the imbalance that you just highlighted. That hasn't happened. In fact, the amount of R and D taking place in Canada has steadily declined.
Despite that fact, through CETA we are actually extending the amount of patent protection that we grant to pharmaceutical companies. As part of the TPP, if the TPP gets revived on the issue of biologics, next-generation pharmaceuticals, in many instances we're locking into levels of protection that will have significant impacts on health care costs and really not serve the national interest in the way that we ought to when it comes to IP policy.
That's not to say that we need to ignore international standards. I started some of my comments by noting that Canada meets its international standards. However, we are often the target of intense lobbying campaigns from some of our largest trading partners who see their national interests, and in a sense, try to take their rules and off-load them into Canada.
We need to remain strong. We need to remain strong in representing that Canadian interest, both when we engage in domestic policies, which I would argue will happen as part of the copyright review later this year, and when it comes to some of the international trade negotiations, notably the NAFTA renegotiation that's scheduled to restart, where it's very clear that some of the same kinds of provisions that we saw within the TPP will resurface within those NAFTA talks.