Stephen Harper

[Sponsorship Program, October 21st, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, when did the Prime Minister learn that his office had been placing calls to the office of Alfonso Gagliano to secure funding for his friends and fundraisers?

[Sponsorship Program, October 21st, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, if the Prime Minister is concerned about the truth, he just has to tell it and it will set us all free.

The Prime Minister cannot expect to come to the House of Commons and refuse to answer questions on the grounds it could incriminate him in another inquiry. He cannot take the fifth amendment on the floor of the Canadian Parliament.

[Sponsorship Program, October 21st, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, if the Prime Minister is worried about accusations and innuendo, he has only himself to blame. The easy solution would be to stand in his place and answer simple, straightforward questions.

I will ask the question again. In February the Prime Minister said that he knew nothing about the sponsorship program and that his office was not involved. Now we find out that it was. Did he know that at the time? How long has he known that his office was making calls to secure hundreds of thousands of dollars of sponsorship money for his bagmen and their associates?

[Sponsorship Program, October 21st, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, in February of this year the Prime Minister went on national television to tell all Canadians that he was mad as hell, that he was out of the loop and that he knew nothing about the conduct of the sponsorship program. Now we know his office made phone calls to Gagliano. We know it resulted in reversing decisions and securing hundreds of thousands of dollars in sponsorship money for his fundraisers and his associates.

How long has the Prime Minister known that these calls were made by his office?

[Supply, October 21st, 2004]

Madam Speaker, that is a complicated question and difficult to answer in a couple of minutes.

First of all, I do listen to some of this testimony. We can read what defence department officials are saying in their internal reports, and I think we understand the state of the military and our long range concern. I admire and understand the difficulty that senior military people have in their roles both as leaders of our military, who are trying to upgrade the military, but also as senior officers of the government who are obliged to, within reason, attempt to defend government policy.

Our view is clear. The Canadian military will never be the largest military in the world and it should not be the largest military. Except for the obviously high end nuclear, it should have a full range of capabilities. Those capabilities, I would say should not be necessarily cutting edge but should be top level capabilities. That is going to take time.

The member is aware that we have made proposals to increase the funding of our military immediately and over time to secure that kind of a defence capability, which is prepared to respond with our allies to a range of flexible and unknown situations in the future.

We can do it with mere functionality as a stop-gap measure, but I think we have to aim for better if we are to play a role in the defence of our own country and in the projection of our values abroad.

[Supply, October 21st, 2004]

Madam Speaker, I can remember the day not so long ago when that member would have stood in his place and said exactly the opposite.

I will just say this, and it is the only answer worth giving. Our men and women are going to stand on the field of battle and be in the dangerous oceans facing death and injury. What they are looking for from their national Parliament is commitment to the values of integrity, commitment, dedication and standing by their team and fighting with them.

[Supply, October 21st, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, let me begin by noting that I will be splitting my time with our deputy leader, the member for Central Nova.

This is a very important issue. Members will recall that during the last election the Liberals tried to denigrate, ridicule and make fun of our very serious proposals to give our military men and women the resources and direction they need to fulfill their vital missions.

Since then, we have witnessed new and even more disturbing examples of the shameful neglect with which successive Liberal governments have treated our armed forces.

As we all know, we have recently had a national embarrassment and tragedy, which, I can assure members, our men and women in uniform do not find amusing or trivial, nor do a majority of Canadians who expect that their government can at the very least ensure the sovereignty of our country and the safety of our society.

The Liberals appear to believe that the world has not changed in the past 30 years, since they started cutting back on the role and resources of the armed forces. The Liberal Party has not changed, but the world situation has.

Canada and its allies face a new global reality, which includes threats of global terrorism, failing states, oppressive regimes and the proliferation of various classes of weapons.

The response of the federal Liberal government to a new security environment which requires vision and vigour has been indifference and incompetence.

In its 1994 defence white paper, this government made a series of critical assumptions. It forecasted a diminishing role for the Canadian military on the international stage. It assumed that the frequency and complexity of future military operations would be lower and their duration shorter.

All of these assumptions have been proven wrong--dangerously wrong--yet the government did not see fit and does not see fit to revisit this policy. While allied countries conducted thorough reviews of their defence policies after 9/11, the Liberal government stubbornly clung to a policy that was already outdated and had been outdated for several years.

Canada is a member of the G-8. Our country ranks second in the world in terms of area. Our system of democracy is respected worldwide. In the two world wars, the Korean war and the numerous peacekeeping operations, our country has earned the admiration and recognition of its allies and of all friends of freedom and democracy.

The sad reality, however, is that we are no longer considered a credible military power. The Liberal government has abdicated, not only its international responsibilities, but its obligations to our soldiers and our national security.

As a lack of policy guidance squandered time and resources, Canada's men and women in uniform have been sent on the widest array of missions imaginable, to every corner of the globe, often without a clear understanding of how their efforts were central to Canada's well-being or whether they had the equipment necessary to carry out their missions effectively.

Over the past 10 years, the federal government has dramatically reduced the capability of our armed forces but at the same time has multiplied its commitments and obligations. In the absence of adequate federal funding, the military has even been obliged to deduct funds from the capital portion of the defence budget in order to pay for basic operations. By 2003, the portion of the defence budget devoted to capital spending had shrunk to only 11.5%, a 50% drop from when this government took office in 1993.

Since it is capital spending that allows the renewal of military capabilities, the future of the military has been sacrificed to pay for its day to day existence. The Prime Minister has recently bragged about his announcements on defence equipment acquisition; however, according to DND's strategic capability investment plan, the Prime Minister's announcements fall short some $20 billion or 75% short of the military's own 15 year defence equipment plan.

The Prime Minister, who likes to talk about everything as “a fix for a generation”, says that he has responded to the crisis in national defence. In fact, the Prime Minister has only approved $7 billion, or 25% of the military's own 15 year, $27.5 billion plan that is loosely based on the government's own 1994 policy and recent operational lessons.

As a percentage of the size of our economy, Canada's defence spending, at 1.2% of GDP, ranks the among the lowest, the second lowest, I believe, of all our NATO allies. Not that long ago, from 1985-87 under a Progressive Conservative government, the Canadian defence budget accounted for 2.2% of Canadian GDP, nearly 50% more in relative terms than today.

We are even more worried by the myopic, clearly minimalist view of military policy that was recently adopted by the government in its discussion of the future role of the armed forces. The Liberal election platform advocated a narrow or niche roles for the military as a whole and there is now every indication that the Prime Minister is seeking to redefine the role of the Canadian Forces on the international stage as one of a mere constabulary operation.

The Conservative Party supports Canada's three long-standing and increasing inter-linked security goals: first, the security of Canada; second, the collaborative defence of North America; and finally, the promotion of peace and security on the international stage.

There is no question in my mind that Canada's military should be increased to at least 80,000 personnel to meet the increasing demands of this security environment.

That is why our motion today advocates a stronger, multi-role, combat capable force to improve Canada's international capacity. To secure the peace in a new security environment, Canada must have multi-role, combat capable forces configured for a full range of military operations from humanitarian support to full combat operations in defence of our national interests.

Notwithstanding our history as one of the most peaceful nations on the face of the earth, the Liberals continue to forget the key lessons of that history, and it is that our identity, our freedoms, our democracy and our values were more often than not won by men and women who were prepared to stand in uniform and pay the ultimate sacrifice.

The world may change, but the nature of humanity has not changed. Today and in the future, our ability to sustain our values here at home and our ability to project those values in a dangerous world will continue to rest on having a strong military. Those are the facts of life, they are the facts of our history, and no sovereign nation can ever forget them.

Let me conclude by mentioning the men and women of our armed forces, who have held up now for decades and increasingly hold up remarkably well under difficult, unfair and extraordinarily dangerous circumstances. But their success is due only to professionalism and dedication. It is not due to the quality and direction of political leadership they have been receiving from this place. They have enjoyed numerous small successes. They have garnered international respect not because of the policies of the government, but despite them.

As we reflect upon the tragedies that have recently befallen at least one of our military families, we need to remind ourselves once again that the men and women in uniform who defend and protect us are always owed as the highest priority by their national Parliament and their national government our priority to defend and protect them.

[Sponsorship Program, October 20th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, apparently these questions finally got the government to answer outside the House of Commons. If the government is prepared to tell us who made the calls, I want to find out when the Prime Minister learned. I will ask again in French if it will help.

We now know when the office of the Prime Minister placed calls to Alfonso Gagliano to get sponsorship money for his fundraiser friend and who placed these calls.

Now, when did the Prime Minister know these calls were being placed from his office?

[Sponsorship Program, October 20th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, Judge Gomery, unless the Prime Minister is planning to give up his seat, cannot come here and answer for the Prime Minister's behaviour on the floor of the House.

The Prime Minister said that he was out of the loop on the sponsorship scandal, but apparently his staff were in the loop. They knew exactly whom to contact to get money for his Liberal fundraiser friends.

When did the Prime Minister know his office was placing calls to Alfonso Gagliano to get sponsorship money?

[Sponsorship Program, October 20th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has been asked 585 questions on the sponsorship scandal this year. He has maintained he knew nothing, he saw nothing and he did nothing, except that we now know his office placed calls to secure sponsorship money for his fundraiser, money that funnelled through Groupe Everest.

When did the Prime Minister learn that his office had made these calls?