National Defence Committee on Nov. 6th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. I'll call to order meeting number 21 of the Standing Committee on National Defence.

Today we have some special guests. We're very pleased that they took the time out of their busy schedules. It's a long way to come to visit with us. We appreciate that you made the effort to do that.

I think there are some key points our visitors have that they want us to comment on. I'll just have them introduce themselves, then if we could, we'll go around the table and start with our usual format and have people introduce themselves and where they're from. Then we'll get into the gist of the matter.

Welcome, Madam Tobias. I'll just let you have a few minutes to introduce your people and maybe give us a little background on why you decided to come to visit us.

[Thandi Vivian Tobias, M.P., Chairperson, Portfolio Committee on Defence, Parliament of South Africa]

Thank you very much, Mr. Casson.

My name is Thandi Tobias, and I'm the chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Defence, from South Africa. Here with me I have my three colleagues.

This a multi-party delegation. On my left we have the Honourable Oupa Monareng, who is a member of the Defence Portfolio Committee and also a member of the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. On my right is the Honourable Somangamane Benjamin Ntuli, and he is also a member of the Portfolio Committee and the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. To his right is the Honourable Velaphi Ndlovu. He is also a member of the Portfolio Committee and the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. We also have our two staff members, E.T. Lourens and Mfanelo Zamisa, from the Ministry of Defence, a parliamentary liaison officer.

Let me briefly take this opportunity to thank you for accommodating us in your hectic schedule, so we can be part of today's meeting. The South African delegation is here on a fact-finding mission to come and learn a few things about how Canada is able to effectively implement your oversight mechanism over the executive. In South Africa, the relationship between Parliament and the executive is not a punitive relationship. There is a separation of powers in terms of responsibilities, so we oversee the work of the executive. The Department of Defence accounts to Parliament, and the Secretary of Defence reports on an annual basis and on the finances, so we vote on the budget of the Department of Defence.

We are having a discussion about the ombudsperson. I know here you call it ombudsman, but we are very sensitive to gender issues in South Africa; we prefer to call it ombudsperson. Currently, the ombudsperson in South Africa resides in the office of the public protector. A debate was being entertained that he or she must be in the Department of Defence. We then decided to go to countries that operate almost the same as South Africa to see how they have modelled the issue of the ombudsperson.

We will be having presentations as part of the program this week. We'll be meeting on Wednesday, I think, to hear a presentation on the ombudsperson.

Thirdly, our interest is with the military academy. As we all know, we need to rejuvenate the army, the military, and all the forces on a continual basis. We want to learn from you how you train your forces and also to have some relationship between South Africa and Canada in terms of exchange programs. That's another aspect that will also be entertained during the course of the week. We also want to learn from you about peacekeeping missions.

South Africa is involved in the African continent, in SADC, the NEPAD program. Currently, we are in Burundi, the DRC, Sudan, Darfur, Ethiopia, and so on. We also know the history of Canada in terms of peacekeeping missions, and I've read some information regarding your priorities. We realize you've been doing a good job, so we also want to learn how you have been doing it, and how we can improve.

That's basically why we are here today, to learn and share experiences with our counterparts, and also to be more effective in our oversight mechanism.

Without any further ado, I will rest my case and allow a discussion.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you very much.

This, too, is an all-party committee. We have members of the opposition and members of the government. Right now, we're in a minority government situation, so the opposition holds the balance on the committees, as well as in the House, if they all work together. We're in an interesting scenario right now.

If we could start with each party, you can all introduce yourselves, then comment on some of the issues that have arisen here.

We'll start with the official opposition, the Liberal Party, then we'll move to the Bloc Québécois, then to the New Democratic Party, and then we'll move across to the government. Then we'll have a back and forth.

Let's do a five-minute round.

We'll start with Mr. Dosanjh, from the official opposition.

[Ujjal Dosanjh, Liberal, Vancouver South, BC]

Thank you.

Thank you for visiting us. I'm Ujjal Dosanjh and I'm from the west coast of Canada--from Vancouver, British Columbia. I'll let my colleagues introduce themselves and then we can carry on after that.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Good afternoon. Welcome; my name is John Cannis. I represent a riding from the city of Toronto, Scarborough Centre. Welcome, and I apologize for being a couple of minutes late.

[Joe McGuire, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

My name is Joe McGuire. I'm from the eastern coast of Canada, from the province of Prince Edward island.

[Andy Scott, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

I'm Andy Scott, the member of Parliament for Fredericton, New Brunswick, also on the east coast of Canada. I represent the riding that has, geographically, the largest military base in Canada.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Do you want to carry on?

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

You'll need your translation device. I'll be talking in French.

There are two official dialogues in Canada: Inuit and French.

[An hon. member]

And Bachandais.

[An hon. member]

Don't forget the Newfies.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Okay, you should be able to hear the interpreter in English.

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

My name is Claude Bachand. I am the member of Parliament for Saint-Jean. The Saint-Jean consituency is located 25 kilometres south of Montreal. I am a member of the Bloc québécois.

You mentioned training. The only training base for recruits in Canada is in my constituency. All those who join the Canadian Armed Forces must spend 13 weeks at the Canadian Forces Base Saint-Jean.

Go ahead, Robert.

[Robert Bouchard, Bloc, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

I am Robert Bouchard, member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord. My constituency is located in Northern Quebec, 200 kilometres from the City of Québec. There is a Canadian air force base with F-18s in my riding. There are two places with F-18s in Canada: Cold Lake, Alberta, and Bagotville, in my constituency.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Good afternoon. My name is Dawn Black, and I'm from the New Democratic Party, the only one from that party on the committee. My riding is in beautiful British Columbia, on the west coast, on the Pacific. I represent New Westminster--Coquitlam. In terms of armed forces, we have a very old and proud regiment there, the Royal Westminster Regiment, which is a militia regiment. I welcome you all here; I think we can have an interesting dialogue about the different ways. As another aside, I have traveled to South Africa as well. Welcome.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Welcome. My name is Blaine Calkins. I'm the member of Parliament for a constituency called Wetaskiwin, which is in central Alberta. Unfortunately, I don't have any military bases in my constituency, but they're all around--at Wainwright, at Penhold, and at Edmonton. I'm surrounded on all three sides. I'm very glad that you're here today, and I look forward to hearing your comments.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

I'm Cheryl Gallant, member of Parliament for Renfrew--Nipissing--Pembroke, which is 100 miles west of Ottawa. Our committee had the privilege of visiting it. We're home to CFB Petawawa, home of 2 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group. We are the training ground of the warriors, and our soldiers are the finest in the world, so I can understand why you'd want to have an exchange with them.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

She's right.

My name is Laurie Hawn and I represent the riding of Edmonton Centre, which is in Alberta. This is where most of the oil and gas is in Canada, and you may hear about that from time to time. I spent 30 years in our air force as a fighter pilot. There are no military establishments in my riding, but I'm very closely connected with the large army base in Edmonton and the large air force base in Cold Lake, Alberta, as well.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

My name is Russ Hiebert. I'm the member of Parliament for a riding that's close to Vancouver, British Columbia, on the west coast. You've heard a number of my colleagues talk about being from Vancouver; just to give you a perspective, it's three time zones away, and I think all of us were on the same five-hour flight last night to come to Ottawa. It's a great distance away. I'm also the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you, committee.

I'm the chairman, Rick Casson. I represent the riding of Lethbridge in southern Alberta. We have the 18th Air Defence Regiment in my riding. They are now a reserve regiment, and we're working on some changes there hopefully in the near future.

I don't know if Mr. Hawn mentioned that he is a former fighter pilot in the air force; if he did, I missed it.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

I did, but feel free.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

When he doesn't back himself up, we do.

The oversight mechanism is your first issue. Does anybody have a comment on the process that we go through as a government with the relationship between the military and Parliament, and how that works?

Go ahead, Laurie.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

I can take a stab at that.

Obviously, there is civilian oversight of the military, and that's the way it has to be. The military is there to serve the policies and objectives of the nation, but they're there as servants. They don't set policy; they carry out policy.

The government's obligation, in my view, is to provide predictable funding over the long term and to support a plan that supports the national objectives, whatever they happen to be, and our individual objectives in conjunction with our allies. The military needs to take that funding and plan and, in my view, develop combat-capable forces above all else, because you can do less demanding missions with more capable people, but it's very difficult to do more demanding missions with less capable people. You have a level of training you need to be at; it almost doesn't matter which mission you do.

The other thing you need to do--you talked about things like military colleges and so on--is develop a leadership model that brings people into the military, whether it's the enlisted ranks and up through the enlisted ranks or the officer corps and up through the officer corps. You need to develop leadership. You do that through a training model through professional development in things like military college, staff school, staff college, National Defence College--there are various levels, all the way up.

You take the people who have demonstrated leadership potential and make sure you give them the extra training that's needed to develop that potential. Over a period of time you wind up with strong leadership throughout the chain of command. Again, they are in the best position to carry out the objectives of the government, to whom they are always responsive and responsible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Go ahead, Cheryl.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

In terms of parliamentary oversight, tomorrow evening will be a fine example of one of our practices. It is something we implemented, something the Conservatives felt necessary when we were in opposition, and that is a committee of the whole, in which we'll have four hours to question the minister on the estimates, expenditures, and what not.