Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That item 12 of the Financial Framework (Supplementary Powers) Amendment (Health and Aged Care Measures No. 4) Regulations 2024 made under the Financial Framework (Supplementary Powers) Act 1997 on 24 October 2024 and presented to the House on 4 November 2024, be disallowed.

I move this motion to disallow the instrument amending the Financial Framework (Supplementary Powers) Act 1997, referred to as the Moderna partnership, tabled by the Minister for Finance in the Senate and then this House on 28 October 2024. The Morrison government struck a deal with Moderna in May 2021 to build a facility in Australia for the domestic production of new vaccines. The Morrison government had failed to procure COVID-19 vaccines in a timely manner. It had lost the vaccine race. It struck a hasty deal without the usual competitive tender so it would be able to announce that it was doing something, knowing full well that that facility would almost certainly be built too late to contribute significantly to the COVID-19 pandemic response. The terms of the deal were kept secret at the time.

We now know that it is a multibillion dollar deal in which taxpayers paid for a facility which is fully owned by Moderna—a facility that has, as yet in 2025, failed to produce a single dose of vaccine for our domestic use. We now know—but only because of the tabling of this disallowable instrument by Senator Gallagher last October—that, as part of the Morrison-Hunt agreement, the government has created a streamlined vaccine procurement process exclusively for Moderna's pandemic and non-pandemic vaccines outside the National Immunisation Program.

The need for pandemic preparedness is still front of mind for all Australians, but this financial arrangement is about more than just preparing ourselves for the next pandemic. It is a commercial leg-up for one company in what is a very competitive non-pandemic vaccine market. This arrangement should be revised to ensure a level playing field for the best Australian and global companies to research, develop and manufacture the best medicines for Australians in Australia. It should be disallowed because it circumvents the standards and safeguards of Commonwealth procurement processes on the grounds of protecting human health when in fact it is to be applied to non-emergency medicines. There is a defined and accepted process for the procurement of medicines and medical treatments in this country. There is no possible justification for non-emergency vaccines sidestepping this process.

The COVID-19 pandemic was the greatest trauma experienced by this country in this century. Thousands of Australians died. Our social and economic life was damaged. Tens of billions of dollars were wasted by the Morrison government on a poorly directed economic stimulus package and on wasteful and opaque spending on diagnostics, PPE and vaccines. We will never know the full extent of that waste, because the Morrison and Albanese governments have refused a royal commission into the management of the COVID-19 pandemic. Without those lessons, we will inevitably be less well prepared for the next pandemic. And so I'm moving this disallowance motion today in the national interest and in the interest of the health of Australians, the health of our economy and the health of the democratic institutions that safeguard the national public interest. I'm moving this motion in the interests of transparency so that a major decision of our government during the pandemic doesn't just slide through this place unnoticed and unquestioned.

Do we welcome the Moderna facility in Australia—Moderna in Australia? Yes, we do. Australia's world-class health and medical research capacity, with which I am personally and particularly familiar, makes us an obvious location for world-class pharmaceutical manufacturing. During the pandemic, Moderna's vaccine development was the fastest ever seen globally. Moderna's mRNA vaccine for COVID saved millions of lives. Do we need to expand our vaccine manufacturing domestically? We clearly do. Right now, only one COVID-19 vaccine is available in Australia. That's Pfizer (COMIRNATY) JN.1. The Albanese government actually decided not to replenish supplies of Moderna mRNA vaccine in late 2024. Those unable to receive mRNA vaccines have been unable to access any form of COVID vaccine in Australia since July 2024, and this has caused a lot of distress to those people who are keen to access the Novavax vaccine. We know that two COVID-19 variants are currently active in Australia. A recent COVID wave affected more than 200 aged-care facilities. Most older Australians have not been immunised for six months or more.

Does government investment in sovereign capability for medicine production domestically make sense? Yes, it does. Our pandemic experience has shown us the risks of global supply chain interruptions, and they've shown us the importance of building expertise and capacity for research and manufacturing onshore and for safeguarding our resources. Australia imports 90 per cent of its medicines. We have ongoing shortages of medicines for ADHD, for diabetes, for palliative care, for HRT, for antibiotics and more. For years, I have been pushing for more support for local medicines production, which we could facilitate through schemes like A Future Made in Australia. But we have no certainty that putting this very large egg in this single basket is going to help our pharmaceutical industry, our vaccines industry, even just our mRNA industry to strengthen and diversify, or that it will provide continuity of local vaccine production before and after this contract expires in 2032. We don't know if the government has looked at other options open to it under the existing facility establishment agreement, such as expanding expenditure for research and development or for manufacturing for research rather than vaccines. These are options which could have significant spillover benefits for Australian medical research capability and for our commercialisation skills.

Do we need to support medical research in Australia? We certainly do, which is why I've been asking the minister to immediately release funds from the Medical Research Future Fund to universities and medical research institutes, which are struggling in a time of decreased local funding for research and development, and at a time when support of Australian medical research by the NIH and other US sources has decreased by $368 million in this year alone.

Why is this deal so concerning? Australia's decades-old system of vaccine procurement ensures that safe, effective and cost-effective vaccines are purchased and provided to the Australian people. The government's arrangement with Moderna is the biggest change to vaccine procurement in Australian history. It gives a massive commercial advantage to one company by making a multibillion contribution to the construction of a new, single facility and to the servicing of its operations, with no transparency as to what, if any, ownership we have of that infrastructure and the ongoing operations of the facility. It gives one single company access to expedited procurement processes, remembering that it takes on average 3.8 years for the PBAC to approve new vaccines in this country. In doing so, this agreement disadvantages other vaccine manufacturers. It creates a disincentive for other companies to invest or expand here. In seeking to build capacity, we are potentially stifling it.

It's wholly appropriate that governments invoke human health considerations during a pandemic. During the COVID-19 pandemic acute phases, both Pfizer and Moderna benefited from alternative health technology assessment processes. We needed those expedited pathways because of the longstanding issues with medical regulatory pathways in this country. Those issues persist. To its credit this government commissioned the health technology assessment review in 2022, but it reported in May 2024, and it's still not scheduling implementation of its recommendations until 2026. That is too slow. We need faster medication approvals. We need to ensure that we are better prepared for the next pandemic. Now is the time to improve the TGA, the PBAC and MSAC, not to build cut-outs for our favoured partners.

We don't know what HDA criteria and assessments will apply to the vaccines produced by this facility. We don't know how they're going to vary from the standard processes. But we do know that the government has actively disapplied the usual rules around competition, value for money, merits review and regulatory impact assessments. And remember that this special treatment is not just for pandemic vaccines. It specifically includes non-pandemic vaccines. There is no possible justification for this carve-out. The usual safeguards for procurement should apply. The usual standards of best product at best value should apply to non-pandemic vaccines produced by the Moderna facility.

Giving a single commercial entity a sweetheart deal undermines competition. Companies which didn't receive taxpayer gifts upfront do not have the same capacity to invest. A business environment characterised by uncompetitive deals is an active deterrent to other companies which might be considering capitalising on Australia's medical research expertise, companies which are considering investing locally in the research and development required to bring new and improved products to our market. A guarantee to a single company to fast-track approvals for their product while their competitors wait three years or more for the same approvals is anticompetitive. It's a deterrent to new research and development, for which we will all be the poorer.

We need our government to always act in the public's best interest, with honesty and transparency. That is more important than ever when it comes to health care. The people in this place should be asking: What is in the best interests of the people of Australia? With this deal from 2021, what is being promised to the Australian taxpayer in 2025 and beyond? How can we guarantee a fair and equal playing field for business investments in this country? How can we encourage research and development and build sovereign capacity for medicine production when we are committing to these sorts of deals? How do we best protect and preserve the health of all Australians?

To that end, I move that this instrument be disallowed, to give the parliament of Australia an opportunity to investigate these really important questions and to act transparently and in the best interests of the health and wellbeing of our constituents.

See this speech in context