Mr. Speaker, I rise on behalf of members of the New Democratic Party to say that we are strongly opposed to this unfair and inequitable bill.
I was frankly very disappointed to hear members of the Bloc Quebecois, who claim to belong to a social democratic party, giving such amazing support to the demands of pharmaceutical companies.
Obviously, there is only one party in this parliament which is fighting for the poor, for ordinary people, who are saying that the big pharmaceutical companies do not need more handouts from their friends in government.
I see the Minister of Industry in the House today. We have had the privilege of serving together in the House since 1979. I am one of the few members of the House who was in the House with the minister in 1987 when he spoke with passion, eloquence and vigour in total opposition to Bill C-22. He called it a giveaway to the multinational pharmaceutical companies. He was absolutely right.
In one memorable quote he said that Bill C-22 would suck the life's blood out of Canada's poorer citizens. I recall it well. The minister was up on his hind legs speaking out and screaming out strongly for justice for Canada's poorer citizens. That was he and the Liberal Party.
Bill C-22 passed. Then in 1992 what did we have? We had another bill, Bill C-91, another Conservative bill and another giveaway to the pharmaceutical drug companies. What did the Minister of Industry have to say at that time? On behalf of his Liberal colleagues, along with the member for Dartmouth and many others, he denounced that legislation and bitterly complained it would lead to a massive increase in the price of pharmaceutical drugs in Canada. The minister was absolutely right.
When we look at the increases in the price of drugs in Canada, it is the fastest growing component of our health care system, far faster than the increase in the price of physician services. Indeed it is the biggest single component of our health care system, as my colleague for Winnipeg North Centre pointed out so strongly on a number of occasions.
Over the past 15 years I would point out that Canada's prescription drug bill has jumped by 344%. That is 15 years since the Minister of Industry warned Canadians about what would happen.
It is not as if these pharmaceutical drug companies are suffering.
The Bloc Quebecois is suggesting that the poor pharmaceutical companies must be defended. It is sad, such a pity, the poor pharmaceutical companies need defending by the Bloc Quebecois.
Let us look, for example, at the largest pharmaceutical company, GlaxoSmithKline, which made profits of some $11.9 billion in one year. It does not need the Bloc Quebecois to defend it. That is clear. Those who need defending are consumers.
It is the consumer, patients, the poor and provincial drug plans that need defence from the government and from their allies in all of the other opposition parties. What an unholy alliance the Liberal government, the Alliance, the Bloc Quebecois and the Conservatives. At least the Conservatives have been consistent. They have been consistently wrong but at least they have been consistent, not like the Minister of Industry who has done the most extraordinary flip-flops.
It was a sight to behold in Davos, Switzerland. I wish I could have been there to see the Minister of Industry speaking in Davos, Switzerland and saying “I fess up, I was wrong Brian”. Brian Mulroney was standing there as proud as punch as the Minister of Industry stood and said he was wrong, the Liberals were wrong and that he was right, NAFTA was a good thing.
A few weeks later he stood in front of the senate, that great bastion of democracy. That was another occasion when he said he had it all wrong back in 1987 on Bill C-22, that the Conservatives were right and the pharmaceutical industry was right. He was there to defend the interests of those poor, suffering pharmaceutical companies. Why? Because the WTO told him that they no choice.
What a shameful spectacle this is. Why should we ever believe anything the minister and the government have to say. I know the Speaker, a man of integrity and respect, will recall those debates because he was in the House. Indeed I dare say he participated in one or two of them. I am not going to pull out the speeches of the Speaker because I know that would be entirely unparliamentary. However it is certainly appropriate to remind the Minister of Industry of exactly what he said. We used to have the lowest priced pharmaceutical drugs in the world. Now, as we have seen, drug prices have risen dramatically.
As the minister indicated, the purpose of the legislation is to implement a WTO tribunal order. We were challenged by the European Union and the United States that our existing generous provisions for patent protection were not good enough.
Until this bill becomes law, the generic drug industry is at least allowed to stockpile and to get their drugs ready six months before the expiry of a patent so that when that patent expires consumers, Canadians who are sick, will be in a position to buy those generic drugs quickly. That is something the Minister of Industry supported long ago, but not anymore. Now they are saying no. Even that six month stockpiling opportunity is gone.
The minister is retroactively extending from 17 years to 20 years the patent protection. This is a retroactive gift to the pharmaceutical industry approved by the Bloc, the Alliance and the Conservatives. Why on earth would the government give this retroactive gift to the struggling pharmaceutical industry that just reported massive record profits? In another day the minister would have been the first on his feet condemning this largesse to an industry that has already been treated far too generously.
As New Democrats, we say that this is unacceptable. When we look at the history of this legislation, it is quite shocking to know that not that long ago under GATT there was no reference at all to intellectual property. In fact it was only after the Uruguay round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade that intellectual property was protected in these so-called trade deals.
That is another reason why as New Democrats we are deeply concerned about the impact of the proposed FTAA, the free trade of the Americas agreement. We know what the Americans are pushing for even more protection. Let us be very clear, it is only the Americans in this hemisphere that are exporting that. It is only those big, multinational American pharmaceutical companies that benefit from this.
Is the Government of Canada and the Minister for International Trade standing up on behalf of Canadians and people throughout the hemisphere and saying to the Americans that there is something wrong with this picture and that they do not support extending the patent protection to 25 years from 20 years? No, there is not a word, not a peep. There is silence.
The trade department keeps telling us to go to its website to find out what Canada's position is. If we go to the website, under intellectual property rights is a summary of Canada's position. Where is the leadership? Is the government speaking out for consumers? Is it speaking out for the poor? This is what the department had to say on intellectual property rights.
To date, Canada has made no submissions to the Negotiating Group on (intellectual property rights). Any submission made by Canada will be made available on the website.
There is the leadership. The government has nothing to say. The Minister for International Trade has nothing to say about one of the most shameful abuses of power by pharmaceutical drug companies. That is their attempt to muscle the government of Brazil in this hemisphere into increasing dramatically the prices of drugs that are made available for people living with HIV and AIDS.
Recently there was a major victory in South Africa when under tremendous international pressure 39 pharmaceutical companies, which were suing the South African government under the WTO, were forced to withdraw that suit because it was obvious they were suffering from international shame. They were trying to tell the South African government and health ministry that they had no choice that, even in the face of a catastrophic epidemic of HIV-AIDS throughout sub-Saharan and South Africa, the interests of multinational drug companies had to come ahead of the interests of patients. Profits before patients.
In the case of South Africa, they were shamed into backtracking and with no thanks to the Government of Canada or the Liberal government. We called on them to show some leadership in a situation of absolute crisis.
There are 25 million people infected with the AIDS virus in sub-Saharan and Africa out of 34 million globally. The multinational pharmaceutical companies want to prevent them from having access to affordable drugs. That is absolutely shameful.
However we see the same thing in this hemisphere in Brazil. We know that in Brazil the government has shown some extraordinary leadership in making generic drugs available. It has had a very powerful and significant impact in reducing the incidence of HIV-AIDS. In 1994 the World Bank predicted that by the year 2000, Brazil would have 1.2 million AIDS carriers. Today there are less than half of that. There are about 540,000. There are still far too many. Thanks to the courage of the Brazilian government in taking on these multinational pharmaceutical companies, it was able to make a difference.
As New Democrats we do not want to see the intellectual property rights of pharmaceutical drug companies enshrined and enhanced in the FTAA. We want to see a new regime where people are put before profits and pharmaceutical drug companies are accountable to the people in the hemisphere and globally.
I am not speaking in any way on behalf of my party, but I often wonder why we believe that in an industry as fundamental to public health and security as the pharmaceutical industry should be driven on the basis of profit. We have a situation now in which only a tiny amount of money, something like $300 million globally, is being spent by the pharmaceutical drug industry in the struggle to find a vaccine. Why is that? Because if it finds a vaccine, it finds a cure and then shares in the pharmaceutical drug companies will not be worth as much money. There is something obscene about that.
We have a situation as well where researchers are working for this pharmaceutical drug company or that pharmaceutical drug company. They are all working in splendid isolation, not co-operating with one another and desperately trying to find what will make them more money.
I suggest that instead of accepting that the market is God when it comes to pharmaceutical drugs, it would make a lot more sense for us to say that this should be in the public domain, those who serve in the health care industry, those who research, those who try to find cures and the government. The public domain should be involved. Health care, and in particular the pharmaceutical industry, should be owned by the people not by those who seek to maximize global profits.
Once again, as New Democrats we do not accept this loss of democracy through the WTO, through the TRIPS agreement, the expansion of GATT and now the FTAA. More and more we are losing democracy in this country. More and more as elected representatives we are losing our ability to make decisions about what is in the best interests of the people who we represent. Bill S-17 is an other example of that.
As elected representatives, as members of parliament, why should we not be in a position to have a public policy debate in Canada about whether 17 years is good enough, or 20 years is good enough or whether compulsory licensing is acceptable as a means of ensuring that, as long as this is in the private sector, there is still an incentive to bring new drugs on the market? However not in a way that jeopardizes access to affordable drugs for Canadians.
That should be a decision we make. However, the Minister of Industry comes before the House and says, “Tough luck. Forget it. You no longer have an option”. As an elected government we no longer have an option. We have no choice because the WTO is forcing us to do this.
One reason why every member of the New Democratic caucus marched in the streets of Quebec City against that FTAA agenda was because we believe in democracy. The agenda of the FTAA, the WTO and GATT is an assault on that democracy. This bill is an example of that.
Instead of moving forward with this legislation, which we vigorously oppose as New Democrats, I call on the government to take a strong stand at the WTO and in the negotiations on the FTAA for affordable accessible drugs for people who are suffering from HIV-AIDS and other life-threatening diseases.
Recently, Médecins Sans Frontières called on the minister of trade not to bow to pressure from pharmaceutical drug companies to further strengthen drug patents. John Foster from the North-South Institute said “It's is absolutely tragic that the minister of trade has absolutely no position on this issue”, the issue of access to affordable pharmaceutical drugs in Brazil. He went on to say “although from prior positions we believe he goes along with United States, drug companies and those in favour of even firmer patent laws”.
We call on the government to stand up for democracy and affordable drugs. Not extend even further the patent protections that are afforded to pharmaceutical drug companies, but recognize that they have already done very well under this legislation. They say they need resources for development of new drugs, yet the reality is that these same drug manufacturers spend twice as much money on marketing their drugs, on pushing their drugs, as they do on research and development.
All hon. members have to do to see this is open the Medical Post or any other major medical journal. Our spokesperson on health has pointed out the absolutely obscene amounts of money that are spent by these companies in marketing drugs.
We also know that we are seeing more and more corporate influence in post-secondary education and universities. Recently a university professor who challenged some elements of the safety of Prozac had his offer of employment at a university in Ontario summarily withdrawn because one of the pharmaceutical companies that funds the university objected vigorously.
Corporate influence is very dangerous in post-secondary education. Corporate influence on this Liberal government is growing and is stronger than ever before.
Once again, we as New Democrats say no to Bill S-17 and yes to affordable drugs for all Canadians.
