Evidence of meeting #80 for National Defence in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was national.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:40 p.m.
Conservative
Peter MacKay Conservative Central Nova, NS
Sure.
Again, Mr. McKay, when we're looking at defence personnel support, that would include such things as contract employees. It would include, in some cases, changes in the role that was being filled by a reservist versus a full-time employee. The defence team personnel support touches on a broad range of activities. It is not confined solely to personnel support for medical...necessarily.
4:40 p.m.
Liberal
John McKay Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood, ON
Okay, so this might actually feed into General Leslie's commentary about too many contractors and not enough soldiers.
4:40 p.m.
Conservative
Peter MacKay Conservative Central Nova, NS
We've taken significant steps, as you know, to reduce contracts.
4:40 p.m.
NDP
Jean-François Larose NDP Repentigny, QC
Mr. Chair, on a point of order, considering the fact that we need clarity and transparency, this is billions of dollars, and every time we have the minister here we always have a short period of time. It's either an hour...and so on and so forth. It gets frustrating. I think the taxpayers and the military deserve to have more time with the minister.
We appreciate that the minister is here, but we need more time. Is it possible on scheduling, before September, for the minister to come back, considering that I don't think we want to wait until Christmas to talk about billions of dollars?
4:40 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
What I had was an agreement to extend the session to allow Mr. McKay to finish off his questioning.
We will entertain that and talk about that at another time.
I want to thank Minister MacKay and Minister Findlay for appearing.
4:40 p.m.
Conservative
4:40 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
I think by the time we get back, there will be only about 15 minutes left on the clock, and I know the ministers won't be available. They have a cabinet responsibility which they have to be at.
I am going to suggest to our other witnesses, Mr. Lindsey, Mr. Martin, Rear-Admiral Finn, and Vice-Admiral Donaldson, that they be available next week possibly to come back to finish off the estimates. Probably on the 29th we'll have time on our schedule for that, for at least one hour.
With that, I want to thank you all.
The meeting is adjourned.
