Pauline Hanson (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'll explain to people what my understanding is and what I have read and come to understand about pharmaceuticals in the agreement. When the free trade agreement was drawn up, it was signed in 2004 and became an act in January 2005 here in Australia. America doesn't have a PBS scheme. We're one of the very few countries in the world that has it; it started up in Australia in 1953. The United States were very concerned about it because the United States wanted to access our market and were very concerned that they wouldn't be able to get medications from pharma onto the market here in Australia. That's why this medicines working group was set up—to allow the Americans to have a say in what medications went onto the PBS scheme.

You may ask why this is of interest to the Americans. It's because pharma make a lot of money out of the drugs they sell worldwide. A case in point is that pharma claims they can spend half a billion dollars to produce a drug, whereas, in fact, a lot of the government research departments and universities do the basics of that drug and then hand it to pharma, and they progress it further. So it really doesn't cost them that amount of money. It could have been around $60 million to $70 million at that time—I am going back to the time when this was drawn up. They pass on that cost to the consumer. It was in the interests of the Americans to get this deal out of Australia—to have an input into the drugs here into Australia.

Also, on top of that, the big problem is generic brands. The generic brands usually have a patent. When these drug companies make the drug, they can have a patent on it. It used to be for around 12 years; then it was extended to 15 years and 20 years, and now it's 25 years. That's because they want to protect it. So when a drug is patented, the drug companies can get big money for it. Once it comes out of the patent, other drug companies can use it and sell the drug a lot cheaper. So it's in their interest to make a lot of money for their shareholders from this drug.

Are we really looking after the purse of the taxpayer in this country? We have seen the cost of the PBS system go up by billions of dollars. I want to put some background to this. There is something that I would like to know, on behalf of the Australian people. Under the PBS scheme, these drugs—the generic brands—are basically the same, but they're cheaper because they're not under the patent of these big companies. Minister, what I would like to ask you is this: If you are going to have taxpayer funded drugs, is it part of your plan to ensure that generic drugs are issued before big pharma or other companies make huge profits out of this? To cut the cost to the taxpayer, will you ensure that generic brands are delivered to the patient or the person who is getting it, if it is the same medication?