Hélène Laverdière

[Foreign Affairs, April 26th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP is extremely concerned about allegations that chemical weapons are being used in Syria.

If this is true, these actions would constitute a complete violation of international humanitarian law. The international community would be obligated to bring the perpetrators to justice.

Will the government abandon its usual rhetoric against the United Nations and join the rest of the world in calling for the United Nations to conduct an investigation into these allegations?

[Petitions, April 19th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, today, I have the great honour of presenting a petition signed by dozens of people across Quebec that emphasizes the important role that Canada can and must play in international development. These people have been affected by the recent cuts to CIDA's budget, and they are asking the Prime Minister to reverse these cuts and restore CIDA's budget.

[International Co-operation, April 19th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, that is quite a non-answer.

The truth is that the Conservatives have made a mess of CIDA.

The minister is completely incompetent and does not know his file: funding has been cut; development assistance is now granted based on the interests of large corporations instead of the interests of the poor; and staff morale is at an all-time low. Now we are hearing that up to a third of CIDA's budget could disappear at the end of this fiscal year.

Can the minister tell us how much of the funds allocated to CIDA were not spent this year because of his incompetence?

[International Co-operation, April 19th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of International Cooperation was not concerned at all when we asked him about funding proposals gathering dust on his desk.

Now we hear that he has failed to get a big chunk of development assistance money out the door. Can the minister tell us how much of CIDA's budget will lapse this year? Is it the plan to cut CIDA's budget through the back door, or is it that the minister cannot handle his workload?

[Business of Supply, April 18th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for her very interesting presentation. Once again, she really highlighted how this agreement, drafted in secret, raises problems because it will allow Chinese companies, including state-owned companies, to sue the Canadian government behind closed doors before arbitration tribunals that have no accountability.

This agreement will undermine our ability to make democratic decisions, particularly concerning the environment. As well as potentially being unconstitutional, this agreement will be binding on this government and future Canadian governments for at least the next 30 years.

In light of all that, does my colleague think, as the Conservatives do, that everything is fine and dandy? Does she believe, as the Liberals do, that we need to go ahead with this agreement to see if it needs a little tweaking? Or does she think it best to tear up the agreement?

[Foreign Affairs, April 18th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the honour of working with many members of Canada's diplomatic corps, true professionals who defend Canada's interests around the globe with great dignity.

Unfortunately, the Conservatives are about to damage the reputation of Canada's diplomatic corps with a questionable appointment. The head of the Prime Minister's security detail, Bruno Saccomani, does not really seem to have the qualifications required of an ambassador to Jordan, no less.

Why did the Conservatives not entrust this important position to a career diplomat?

[International Trade, April 17th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the Europeans have asked that any new trade agreement signed with Canada include major changes to our system for the protection of intellectual property, which would raise the cost of medications by about $2.8 billion.

However, last week, the Europeans announced that they had dropped this demand in their trade negotiations with India.

Can the Minister of International Trade confirm that Canada will receive the same treatment?

[International Co-operation, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, it would take me 10 minutes to reply to all of that.

First, my colleague said that civil servants have testified against this bill at committee while the bill never went to committee. I am wondering if he even took time to read the bill, which I doubt.

Then he said that it is outside our trade obligations. The experts who have participated in WTO negotiations to set up the framework that would permit that said that the bill was completely consistent with WTO obligations.

Then we are told that it would infringe on patent protection and basically that it would affect brand name pharmaceuticals. The brand name pharmaceuticals wrote to the leaders of all the main parties in December to say that they had no objection to seeing the bill go to committee.

Really, the Conservatives are so isolated and they are trying to find arguments that just do not hold water.

[International Co-operation, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I am here today to speak about Bill C-398, which would have reformed Canada's access to medicines regime in order to provide lower-cost medicines to thousands of people around the world with life-threatening illnesses and diseases such as HIV, malaria and tuberculosis.

I spent 18 months consulting all the concerned parties. I spoke with brand name drug manufacturers who were against the previous bill, but were in favour of this new bill being referred to committee. I met with a generic drug maker who has already used Canada's access to medicines regime. He explained to me why the current regime was not working. I also met with representatives of a large network of civil society organizations that supported the bill.

My colleague opposite did not make as much of an effort.

In fact, it was only in the days before the vote that he spoke to the brand name pharmaceuticals and he did so only after the same pharmaceuticals had written to us to say that they were ready to see Bill C-398 go to committee. Why? Because the people on the other side of the House did not really care about the bill. They had decided from the start that they were going to oppose it for partisan reasons. If it meant doing away with the truth, they did not care.

Let me give just a few examples.

The Conservatives argued that the bill would weaken the safeguards, ensuring that medicines would not be not diverted. This is simply false. All the safeguards adopted by Parliament when it first created CAMR unanimously in 2004 remain. None of them were changed.

They said that it would remove measures to ensure the quality of medicines being supplied. That is false again. There was absolutely no change to the requirement for Health Canada to review all drugs exported.

The Conservatives argued it would violate Canada's obligation under the World Trade Organization's treaty on intellectual property rights. Again, that is not true. Experts have testified that Bill C-398 would be fully compliant with WTO rules.

Then the Conservatives said that it could jeopardize negotiations for a free trade agreement with Europe. Oops, the E.U. has similar regulations.

In fact, all these so-called arguments are just excuses for the Conservatives to oppose the bill. That is why they came up with something else every time their arguments were refuted.

When they ran out of solid arguments, the Conservatives started talking about what the government has done to combat HIV/AIDS in Africa. I suspect that my colleague opposite will do the same in a few moments.

It is good to combat AIDS in Africa, but why could we not also adopt a measure at no cost to the taxpayer that would get the most out of the money allocated to humanitarian aid, save lives and even create jobs in Canada?

A few days before the vote, we actually had enough support for the bill to go to committee, including from Conservative MPs, but the government decided it would not let this happen. It put partisanship before a life-saving measure. It circulated lies about the bill. It pressured its MPs not to vote for what they believed was right and it ended up disappointing thousands of Canadians. Now the government can wear it.

[International Co-operation, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I must admit that I like to hear my hon. colleague talk about the importance of working with all of the partners. That is precisely one of this government's main problems.

It wants to work with the extractive industry but does not seem to do much with other private companies. It seems to focus exclusively on that sector.

Furthermore, there is no call for proposals for partnerships with Canadians. The government seems to be less inclined to work with civil society organizations. The list could be very long.

When I hear that all partnerships are important, I feel a bit in doubt that this is the policy followed by the government. As for the counsellor for CSR, unfortunately, the counsellor does not have the tools that person needs. Therefore, I think it is a very weak answer on the part of the government.