Douglas Young

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, what we will have to do, I guess, is draw pictures to make sure that the hon. member and his colleagues will have some understanding of what is going on.

I have on two occasions during question period referred to a document provided by the commissioners last fall, in 1996-

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I can assure my hon. friend that if I was trying to hide something from the hon. member and his friends, it would not be nearly as difficult as putting a needle in a haystack because I do not think they could find anything that was right in front of their very noses.

The hon. member raises this question and says that the alleged shredding took place under the watch of this government. The shredding that allegedly took place which was referred to by the former prime minister took place while that person was minister of national defence.

The incidents in Somalia and much of what the hon. member alludes to happened while a previous administration was in charge of the affairs of the country. But we are not going to slough that off. Maybe the hon. member thinks that I am spending my time in the House and working as the Minister of National Defence to protect members of a previous administration or people who have gone on to other walks of life.

What the government is trying to do is to clean up a mess, one of many, that occurred while the previous administration was still in power. We have not been perfect in getting it done. I would agree to that. But it is a long way from the total lack of understanding and comprehension of the events and the facts that the hon. member and his colleagues so abominably display in here nearly every day.

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, as is often the case in the House, I will certainly give the benefit of the doubt to the hon. member. It is not the first time that we put an end to a inquiry's mandate, even though I know it takes time to conduct an inquiry and to find out what happened.

As I said, it is not the first time, but we will let the hon. member get away with his erroneous statement, because I know he did not make it in bad faith. He simply does not know any better.

But, to answer his question, nothing prevented the commissioners from setting up their own agenda. While there may have been delays in providing information, nothing prevented the inquiry from calling on any witness to answer questions.

Let us not forget that the mandate of the Somalia inquiry was extended three times. The last time, the inquiry even told the government it would table its report before the end of June. We agreed three times. Now that we say it is time to complete the job, the hon. member calls it political interference. It is fine when we say yes, but it becomes political interference when we say no.

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot presume, as does the hon. member, that the inquiry was about to question anyone in particular. Indeed, the inquiry has always decided who it would call to testify and how it would proceed.

I made reference to a document sent to Privy Council by the inquiry, in which it is said that the commissioners' preferred scenario would have been for the Somalia inquiry to continue until the end of May 1998, with the report being completed only by the end of that same year.

It would be pure speculation on my part to try to guess who was going to be called to testify, given that, in a two-year period, the inquiry heard over 100 witnesses and apparently did not see fit to call those whom the hon. member thinks it should have heard.

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, to be absolutely honest, what I am afraid of is that the hon. gentleman and his colleagues will continue for the next two or three years with this absolutely unacceptable kind of approach.

They try to paint everybody in the armed forces as being involved in cover-ups, involved in mismanagement and involved in the kinds of activities to which the hon. member and his colleagues keep alluding without ever once taking into account the fact that the vast majority of men and women in the Canadian forces at every level do their jobs well and honourably.

If the hon. member really believes the Canadian forces deserve to be supported, he should be among the very first to stand up and to recognize that. I know he goes on to the bases. I hope he and his colleagues continue to avail themselves of the opportunity to go out and meet with the men and women of the Canadian forces at all ranks. I hope they try to get a grip on what is really going on there instead of continuing to try to exploit a political situation, where I say to my hon. friend, you are going down the tubes.

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member, as I have said often in the House, has had a distinguished career over many years in the Canadian forces.

I simply want to say through you, Mr. Speaker, to the member who has put the question that surely, as was the case yesterday in committee, hon. members are not going to stand in the House or use opportunities elsewhere to tarnish the reputation of all the men and women who serve in the senior echelons of the Canadian forces.

Everyone recognizes that mistakes were made and some very heavy prices were paid by people at the very senior levels of the Canadian forces. There have been significant changes in the upper echelons of the Canadian forces and the Department of National Defence.

Surely the hon. member and some of his colleagues who have served in the Canadian forces understand that to continue to pursue this denigration of men and women who have made a commitment to Canada and the Canadian forces and who have served in the most distinguished and honourable ways not only in Canada but around the world cannot continue.

Surely the hon. member after his distinguished service has a few shreds of decency left in him and-

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member often refers to the bottom of the ladder. He is obviously far more familiar with the bottom of the barrel.

In his previous question the hon. member talked about when the commissioners had assured him they would be able to report. I have indicated clearly that there is another view from the commissioners with respect to when they could properly report.

With regard to another allegation made by the hon. member, I will help him out this time rather than embarrass him. Maybe I could suggest to the hon. member that he check his facts to find out for sure whether any government in Canada has ever put an end to an inquiry, before he repeats that allegation again.

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, because of my respect for the House and awareness that question period answers should be brief, I will not address all of the irresponsible and absolutely wrong-headed information the hon. member tried to put into his question.

Let me deal with one specific issue very briefly. The hon. member said that the commissioners have apparently said to him or to someone that they would be totally finished by the end of December of this year. That is what I heard the hon. member say.

Let me quote from a letter sent by the commission of inquiry into the deployment of Canadian forces to Somalia to the Privy Council. This is a quote from a document provided to the government through the Privy Council directly by the commission: "Scenario one, the most desirable or optimum scenario". It goes on in too much detail for me to take the time of the House but let me go to the conclusion: "The most desirable or optimum scenario would result in the completion of hearings by May of 1998, followed by a four to six month period thereafter for the production of the final report".

The hon. member sooner or later has to make an effort at getting his facts straight.

[Somalia Inquiry, February 13th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is totally irresponsible. There is no one in Canada who believes that there was or there is today a cover-up of the murder.

The government has said and I as the minister has acknowledged that there were many mistakes made in how the military institution responded to the absolutely intolerable events that occurred in Somalia which resulted in the killing of Somali citizens. There is no question about that.

As I said and as the hon. member knows, every Canadian who really wants to get a clear understanding of what took place in Somalia knows who pulled the trigger. Everybody in Canada knows exactly what happened on the ground in Somalia to the extent that it can be determined after two years of work by the commission, the military investigations, the courts martial and everything else that took place.

The hon. member is trying to continue to pursue an opportunity that he thinks his party has, that his own leader totally disagreed with when in September 1996 he stood in his place in the House and asked the Prime Minister of Canada for a guarantee that the Somalia inquiry would end before the election. He did not have a word to say about the truth or about the facts. He simply wanted it ended.

[Canadian Government, February 13th, 1997]

It came from the heart.