Mr. Speaker, I listened to some of the speech of the hon. member opposite. Perhaps my reading of the bill is different than hers but my understanding of the bill is that it is basically a codification of regulations that currently exist under two other acts.
I know that in the last Parliament when the Liberal Party was in opposition we fought very hard against government by regulation on many bills that were put before this place. We believe that when measures impact on the people of the country by way of regulation, wherever possible they should be codified. If flexibility is needed that is fine, but the place to debate major changes is certainly on the floor of the House of Commons. It is my understanding that we are not going in the direction of further regulation but we are going in the direction of codification of existing regulations under some acts.
She spoke for a bit about the pharmaceutical industry. I can certainly tell her that when Bill C-91 hit the floor there was great debate on all sides about the impact of that bill on both sides of industry plus consumers in the health care sector of Canada. One of the major things that this side fought for, and we had a particular point of view on it, was that the regulations inherent in that piece of legislation had to at least go before a parliamentary committee to be debated.
I do not know what the position of the members on her side was. I think they did support the bill but we did not. That was one of the reasons. We believe strongly that when we are dealing with things such as C-91 and indeed when we are dealing with enforcement under the Narcotics Control Act or the Food and Drug Act the place these regulatory changes should be debated is here on the floor of the House.
I would like to get her comments because she did mention the pharmaceutical industry. I would like for her to sort of broaden that out because I did not quite buy her argument insofar as it related to the pharmaceutical industry in Canada.