Hello. My name is Patrick Kerr. I'm just a concerned citizen. I don't represent anybody. I'm not being paid to be here.
I don't have a lot of time to speak, so I'll just say right off the bat that I am against this agreement. I would be very much for discussing it, if that were an option, but unfortunately, as I understand it, we've been given an ultimatum, and Canada cannot renegotiate this. As it stands, I am against it.
Why am I against it? Because of a number of things. Obviously, there's probably quite a bit in those 6,000 pages, but I'll speak to the things that cause me the most fear.
With respect to the investor state provisions, I'm not sure that all of you are aware of what is involved, but the potential implications are the things that I am the most concerned about. I say “fear” because none of these things has actually happened and the agreement doesn't exist at this point, but we can look at other agreements that are in place, such as NAFTA . I can't remember what the Chinese agreement is that was passed recently, but we already have a hearing on board with respect to that one.
These types of provisions allow these companies or corporations to sue our government, essentially, or to sue our people and take our money, if they don't agree with our environmental policies or our safety and security policies or if they deem them to be unfair and cutting into their profits. They're allowed to do that. On that, I am concerned that in order to appease these companies and these corporations for the sake of profits, we will undermine our environment and our health, and I don't think that is a wise idea in the long term.
It's a question mark. It's an unknown. We don't know what types of lawsuits are going to be put against us, but we can look at some of the things that have already been put against the country as far as NAFTA is concerned. I won't get into those details. I don't have that much time, but those types of lawsuits are cause for concern, and that's the number one reason I'm against the TPP.
Other reasons have to do with extended patents and the implications for pharmaceuticals. Canada is the only country in the world that has a national health care program without a national pharmacare program, and it's going to make it a lot harder to have a national pharmacare program if the prices of pharmaceuticals are even higher than they already are, amongst other things.
I could go on, but I don't have time. Thank you.