Foreign Affairs Committee on Nov. 19th, 2013

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

But, it's....

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

We're signing. We have the different exclusion clauses. Do you know a country that we have military operations with that has planted landmines in the last 10 years? Can you name one?

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

We know of ones that have used cluster munitions.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Absolutely.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

But, that's the point.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Because we have allies that use them.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

That's right.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

I don't know if we have any allies that....

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I think you're arguing in favour of making sure we have provisions to exclude—

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

But, I'm saying it's easy to exclude landmines if we don't have any allies using those landmines. I don't know. I'm not saying—

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

We could use them. They exist. Let's not get into these—

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

No—

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

It's not.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

—but do you know of any time in the last 25 years of a country who is an ally of Canada and who has used landmines? I can't think of one.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

It's not the point in treaties and implementation of treaties. It's not whether or not they were just used. If they can be used, the technology is there to use them. We want to rid the world of them. We want to make sure there are ironclad guarantees for our forces.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

But it's easy to have an ironclad guarantee if the practice isn't used anymore.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

But we have been in theatre where the protocol has been in place and it's been tried and true. What I'm saying to you, Minister, at the end of the day...you started off by saying let's look at this clause 11, if we want to get the job done. You're saying that in 99.9% of the cases it's not an issue so, I'd flip it around to you and say then why not have this provision in place?

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

But, I want to—

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

It's not going to interoperability.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

I want to come back to your issue with the Ottawa landmines treaty—

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I don't....

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

—because you brought this to me, and I challenged our officials on it. I notice that when the government doesn't agree with our officials on a political level, we're slapping the face of the professionals who know what they're doing. When we support the officials, we shouldn't.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I wasn't talking about the officials at all.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

I want to come back to the landmines. Can you name any ally of Canada in the last 25 years who has planted landmines?

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

It's about the protocol and integrity of the treaty and how that's protecting our Canadian Forces. That's what we're getting at. I heard that you were open to look at that and that's all we're asking.