Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am going to share the time I have available with my colleague, Ms. Lalonde.
Thank you for being here, Mr. Minister.
We have quite carefully studied the targets and the progress indicators for January, February, March, and those we have before us today.
Even though I was not very good at science, my science professors used to say that, if you wanted to do studies over time, you always had to base them on the same data. It seems to me that we are not using the same data here. Let me explain. I think the targets and the progress indicators have changed or have been watered down. For example, if, in a previous report, performance in security was established by the number of districts under control and if now we are focusing on operational performance, it is not the same thing. Previously, we used to look at the number of districts in which things were moving forward and we calculated progress accordingly. Your report no longer does that. Now we are focusing on operational performance. So the data are different. It is hard for members to draw comparisons because we are no longer using the same data.
I have other examples, like the percentage of security operations conducted by the ANA. Your baseline is that 45% of security operations are conducted by the ANA. You tell us that the quarterly result is that 71% of security operations are conducted by the ANA. But your target for 2011 is 65%. You tell us that we are at 71% now, that we will be at 65% in 2011, and that this is progress. I do not see where the progress is.
In addition, the area of responsibility has changed and it will change more and more as the Americans arrive. Canadian soldiers used to have responsibility for all the area and all the Kandahar district. From now on, they will have the city and the surrounding area, and the Americans will look after the rest. It is easy to say that we will achieve our targets because some of the data is different from the previous report. Some data will change, and, as a result, you can expect things to go very well in 2011, because you are failing to account for the significant help that we will receive from the Americans.
Do you agree with me that, in the document we are studying today, the progress indicators and the targets are not the same as they were for the January, February and March period?