National Defence committee  My suggestion is that we could actually save some money by using the coast guard or developing the coast guard and having it partner with the Canadian Forces. One needs to think about this in terms of what it actually takes to provide a presence and also an interdiction capacity, because in the Northwest Passage, it's the ability to actually stop ships that will be the ultimate test of Canadian control there.

National Defence committee  I don't know if the costing has been done precisely, but I've certainly asked many people, including the coast guard, what it would take to provide these kinds of vessels. One of the issues—and you'll will be very sensitive to this as someone from the Atlantic provinces—is whether we build these ships in Canada or whether we buy them off the shelf abroad.

National Defence committee  I'll start with a short answer to the question before handing it over to Greg. First of all, on the Northwest Passage, it is important to remember that the principal opponent of Canada's legal position is the United States, and both the United States and Canada are members of NATO.

National Defence committee  I will keep it very short, Monsieur Coderre. First of all, you're absolutely right, I think the coast guard is an orphan in terms of the federal bureaucracy in Ottawa, and placing it underneath the umbrella of the Department of National Defence would be a good thing as long as DND understood that those essential civilian functions need to be continued too.

National Defence committee  I would simply like to point out that the American four-star general in charge of NORAD was very quick to correct the Canadian Minister of Defence by pointing out that the Russian planes came nowhere close to Canadian airspace, and that “the Russians acted professionally”. It is a bit ironic that at the same time as Russian aircraft were causing this controversy in Ottawa, the senior lawyer at the Department of Foreign Affairs was negotiating with his Russian counterpart about the possibility of Russia and Canada making a joint submission to the United Nations Commission on the limits of the continental shelf with respect to jurisdiction over the Arctic Ocean seabed.

National Defence committee  Thank you very much, Monsieur Bernier, for inviting me. As you probably know, I am the leader of two ArcticNet projects on Arctic sovereignty, ArcticNet being a consortium of more than 100 scientists from 27 Canadian universities and five federal departments. I've also travelled extensively in the Arctic.

Foreign Affairs committee  I have thought about it, and I can see arguments in favour of the status quo and arguments in favour of a merger. My own view, having watched past efforts to divide Foreign Affairs from International Trade and then put them back together, is that you create a lot of work for public servants simply by reorganizing the chairs.

Foreign Affairs committee  I think we could contribute quite significantly with regard to relations with China. We're certainly seeing that Secretary of State Clinton has made that a big priority for herself. We have experience, we have an enormous expatriate community, and we have quite significant linguistic and trade connections.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. Merci beaucoup.

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes, although we have to be careful not to rest on our laurels. Just because we got it right in the past doesn't mean we should stop there. We do have credibility on the financial regulation dimension, but we're losing credibility on other issues, like, for instance, on security regulations, where we don't have a national security regulator, which is fairly unusual for an OECD country, or on the economic issue of climate change.

Foreign Affairs committee  I think that's one of a number of different things that would contribute to strengthening our profile as an international actor. I know there are complexities involved in creating a national securities regulator and I know we haven't had any disasters because of the lack of one, but in terms of our international perception that would be an important thing.

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes, absolutely. I think we do ourselves and the United States a disservice by postponing diplomatic engagement on this issue. Postponing diplomatic engagement was a viable option 20 years ago, before the ice started to melt. But during the last two summers the Northwest Passage has been wide open.

Foreign Affairs committee  When the United States does its seabed mapping, it almost immediately puts all of its data up on the Internet for everyone to see. They believe in transparency and that international cooperation, not just with Canada but with countries like Russia, is actually furthered by being totally open about the scientific character of the seabed.

Foreign Affairs committee  That's a difficult question. It's a sensitive question. I'll give you a straight response, which is that a decentralized country like Canada does sacrifice some of its weight in the world by not speaking with one voice. Countries like the United Kingdom or France, which are relatively unified central states, do punch above their weight in international affairs, and Canada has lost some of its weight over the last couple of decades as we've decentralized our Confederation.

Foreign Affairs committee  It's a wonderful question, and it enables me to raise the point that some ships actually travel submerged and the issue of submarine transits of the Northwest Passage is a very pertinent issue, particularly because the Los Angeles Times last Saturday reported that a U.S. nuclear-powered submarine from Norfolk, Virginia, is going to be participating in an exercise north of Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, in the next couple of weeks.