Government Operations Committee on Sept. 29th, 2022

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Thanks so much, Mr. Chair.

I also agree that Mr. McCauley has brought forward a very good and timely motion. I think it is important to note that we have heard from people on this issue. Irving's workforce is 98% Canadian. Irving has its pathways to shipbuilding program, which has members of the Black community in Nova Scotia and members of indigenous communities. They're studying at Nova Scotia Community College in areas like welding, etc. Those people are going straight to work at Irving. Pretty much 100% of them get hired following their degree.

I was just wondering—again, it's obviously up to Mr. McCauley—if he would consider adding Nova Scotia Community College to be a witness as well, given that the college is the one in partnership with Irving to give pathways to shipbuilding for minority communities. I think it would be useful to hear from them as well in the context of this study.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Mr. Housefather, are you moving that as an amendment?

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

I just wanted to hear if my colleague Mr. McCauley agrees to it. If he does, I would be happy to.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Right at this point in time you're asking Mr. McCauley if he has consideration of that. Go ahead, Mr. McCauley.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Generally if there's support on your side and we can just settle this quickly, move forward and vote on it, then fine. My biggest concern is, again, it's a 20-year or 30-year project. We're flying in foreigners to work on this. I'm sure they're wonderful people, but we're flying in people from out of the country. I'd like to hear specifically why. I have capable first nations people in Alberta. Why are we not making the commitment to them over a 20-year or 30-year period to train and upgrade those skills, and so on? If you want to bring them in, then, perfect, I'd be happy to. We can vote on this, and then move forward and get back to our witnesses.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Okay.

I move to amend it to add Nova Scotia Community College as a witness.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

We have an amendment to the amended motion. I'm looking around the room. Is there consensus?

I'm seeing thumbs up. It's unanimous.

(Amendment agreed to)

(Motion as amended agreed to)

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Thank you, Gord and Anthony.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you very much.

With that, I thank the witnesses for bearing with us as we dealt with that issue.

We'll go to Mr. Kusmierczyk. We have 10 minutes left. I am going to change the time frame and go with four minutes around the table. We'll go with two minutes for Mr. Johns and Ms. Vignola.

You have four minutes, Mr. Kusmierczyk.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's terrific work and collaboration by the committee today.

Mr. Norante, I read with interest about the Cormorant Trophy that is handed out every year to a worthy helicopter rescue team. Last year, of course, it was the first time that a joint U.S.-Canada team received such recognition for a heroic rescue mission. It was described as operating in some of the most severe weather conditions known.

I just wanted to ask you this. The Cormorant has provided over 100,000 flight hours for the Royal Canadian Air Force. During that time what have we learned about the Cormorant and its capabilities?

[Francesco Norante]

I think what we have learned, in my personal opinion, is that it's the most-suited platform out there to do these types of rescue missions, especially in areas across the Atlantic and in the Arctic. It's a unique platform. The mid-life upgraded Cormorant is even better. It has been successfully delivering in different countries. In Norway it's being used very well. We are convinced that this would give us in Canada an advantage. It will help to rescue more people. It will diminish fatalities under critical conditions.

You even saw last year in British Columbia how successful the Cormorant operation was. We think the new platform is going to be much better and more advanced. We're looking at the next 20 years of operations.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Okay, that's terrific.

Obviously, with climate change and seeing more severe disruptions and weather conditions that our rescue crews have to operate in, how much more important is it to make sure that you have the right mix of platform and training for our search and rescue men and women?

[Francesco Norante]

Your question is well posed. I think that there is a technical requirement, and Cormorant is currently the only platform out there that is fully compliant with the requirements of the Government of Canada for search and rescue operations. You're looking at new capabilities, advanced capabilities, that are not present in any platform at the moment.

Leonardo invested years of research and development to be sure that we could offer to our ultimate client, in this case the Canadian Forces, the best machine out there.

Obviously training is the second part of the puzzle. People need to be trained, but there is artificial intelligence involved, so there are additional capabilities the machine has to diminish human error. The new Cormorant is going to be mind-blowing for the users in Canada.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you very much.

I have a question for Mr. Carroll.

Gripen is arguably one of the best fighter jets in Europe, but in the last number of months, we've seen the F-35 win bids in European countries, in 2018 in Belgium and in 2020 in Poland. Switzerland, Finland, Germany and Czechoslovakia all selected the F-35, and they all operate within the same theatre of operations, arguably.

Can I ask what advantage it has, for example, for a country that is going to be operating in that theatre to follow suit, follow the same plane and platform and acquire the same plane and platform that other European countries are acquiring?

[Simon Carroll]

Thanks for the question.

I'll defer to my colleague, but I'll come back at the end if there's something else.

[Patrick Palmer]

I guess the way I'd answer—

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Mr. Palmer, answer in 30 seconds, if you can. I hate to put a time strain on you.

[Patrick Palmer]

I'll do my best.

What I would say is that I can talk about the capability of Gripen. I can't talk about the various countries in terms of why they choose different things, but I will say, about the capability of Gripen, how formidable it is, how relevant, upgradable and current it is.

I will also say that, if you look at that environment and you're putting all your eggs in one basket and you have an issue with one, where one of them isn't flying, then you're not able to do any missions. You're not able to have any mission success at all. There is some argument as well to not all have the same equipment, whether they be airframes, aircraft, fighter jets or anything.

Again, I'll talk to you about the capability of Gripen. I can't talk to you about what other countries have chosen.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Now we'll go to Ms. Vignola for two minutes.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

I will be brief.

Sweden is a relatively northern country. I think we can say Sweden is in the North and Canada is also a country with a large Arctic zone.

What are the Gripen’s advantages in Arctic zones?

[Patrick Palmer]

Gripen is designed to operate in the Arctic. It's designed to operate in extreme temperatures, both hot and cold, but it's really proven to be operable in the Arctic. As you know, operating in Canada's far north is incredibly taxing and incredibly hard on, not only the equipment but also the people and everything else. Gripen is definitely designed for that activity.

When you look at what's happening around the world today and you look at the threats that Sweden faces, we face the same threats. Sweden, from a proximity perspective, have interactions, negatively, with Russia all the time. The Gripen was designed to meet those threats, to operate in that environment and to operate very well in that environment.

I think the Gripen is a proven, capable aircraft operating in the north.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you.

I would like to quickly come back to the fact that Saab met all of the requirements. You received written confirmation. And yet, the Government of Canada decided to choose Lockheed Martin.

Do you think that undue pressure was deliberately placed on the government to lead it to make this choice?

[Simon Carroll]

We can't comment on what transpired between the Canadian and the U.S. government because, quite simply, we don't know. That said, we are very confident that our fully compliant Gripen remains the best fighter for Canada.

As we mentioned in our opening comments, Canada's decision to move into the finalization phase to negotiate with the competitor to determine costs, benefits and deliveries—which are mandatory requirements as part of the program—is inconsistent with the FFCP procurement guidance that we were given.