With a stable minority Parliament for the foreseeable future, we can expect that the Government will continue to move forward on a variety of issues important to our industry including completing the Self-Care Framework, passing the legislation to modernize the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, and adopting a workable animal testing ban based on the EU model within our Canadian regulatory context. We can now also anticipate approval of a Health Canada issued GMP certificate to facilitate the export of cosmetics to China without animal testing.
A new Government would have required a significant lobbying effort on our behalf to ensure that the work of the past few years on these and other issues was not undone or detrimentally altered as a new administration put it’s own stamp on various initiatives or pursues different priorities. An unstable minority – of whatever party – would have meant that day to day politics would dominate the Government’s agenda with little time for the detailed work that needs to be done. Other than the risks of unwanted amendments at the committee stage for legislation, where the Government will not have a majority, the incoming Parliament should offer a good opportunity for us to continue with our ongoing efforts in a productive manner.
As with all elections, there are numerous new MP’s including several in areas where our industry has member companies. We will be developing an outreach campaign to ensure that we introduce them to our industry and our issues and may be asking for your engagement with us. We will also be watching for any changes in Ministers responsible for Departments important to our industry as the prime Minister is expected to shuffle the cabinet sometime in October.
