Mr. Speaker, I am extremely pleased to have the opportunity to speak in favour of this bill, which I support.
Canada's access to medicines regime was created in 2004 with support from all parties. At the time, the bill arose from a commitment by the Government of Canada. It was passed unanimously, meaning that it was supported by the House and all parties. That is why I have a hard time understanding why so many members are opposed to this bill. It is not proposing anything new. It is not a trap. It remedies a problem, period.
It is clear that there is a problem with Canada's access to medicines regime since it has received only one request, namely an order for drugs for triple therapy for treating people with HIV-AIDS in Rwanda. Even then, the company that made the request said it would never use the program again because it was too complicated.
Canada's access to medicines regime currently allows generic versions of pharmaceutical products to be exported to developing countries in order to fight various pandemics and epidemics such as HIV-AIDS, but also tuberculosis and malaria, to name a few.
I do not have enough time today to get into the details of this very important bill, but we would do well as Canadians and parliamentarians to support this bill. We made a commitment to these developing countries. As the member who spoke before me said, it is important for Canada to save lives in those countries.