Marise Payne (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Faruqi for her question. We have been consistent in our approach on the TRIPS waiver, but let me begin by saying that we are also very disappointed that the WTO's 12th Ministerial Conference, MC12, has been postponed owing to the occurrence of the omicron COVID-19 variant. We've consistently said that Australia will support a TRIPS waiver and our position has not changed. A waiver can only be passed with the support of all 164 WTO members, and there is no proposal on the table right now that has the required level of support. We are, as I said, disappointed that the conference has been postponed, but we remain committed to delivering an ambitious and meaningful outcome on the waiver. We are working with other countries to find common ground on a solution that will ensure all countries can overcome any intellectual property barriers as they respond to COVID-19 or future pandemics.

We are, I would note, committed to supplying up to 60 million vaccine doses to our region by the end of 2022, including to a significant number of developing nations: including 20 million vaccine doses that Australia has already committed to share with the Pacific and South-East Asia by mid-2022; an additional 20 million doses from Australia's own supply, to be shared by the end of 2022; and up to a further 20 million doses to be procured through a partnership with UNICEF, also to be shared by the end of 2022. And we have already shared more than 9.2 million of these doses across our region as at the end of this month, including 4.6 million doses to Indonesia, 1½ million to Vietnam, one million to Fiji, 700,000 to the Philippines delivered last week, almost 678,000 to Timor-Leste, over 200,000 to the Solomon Islands and over 200,000 to Papua New Guinea. We have committed $130 million to— (Time expired)