Evidence of meeting #44 for National Defence in the 41st Parliament, 2nd session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was process.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake, MB
I don't think we'll have a whole lot of time here. I just want to point out that under the Liberals they didn't have any procurement issues because they never bought a single piece of equipment, so nothing ever got delayed. It wasn't an issue and problem back then.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake, MB
And they paid for nothing. They were good at cancelling contracts. We know that.
I want to get clarification on this one chart you have. If understand it, Professor, in your comments, you've said that Holland and Norway are changing their offsets because, as you said, they're members of the European Union.
Professor, Department of Management and Economics, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
Correct.
Conservative
Professor, Department of Management and Economics, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
It's a member of NATO.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake, MB
NATO, okay, but your comment was that the European Union is changing procurement practices, not NATO.
Professor, Department of Management and Economics, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
It was a mistake on my part.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake, MB
I don't believe NATO is forcing members to change procurement practices.
Professor, Department of Management and Economics, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
The European Union is moving toward rebuilding the offsets.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake, MB
Yes.
I appreciated the presentations you both made.
I just want to follow up on the report you issued, Mr. Perry. You had a number of pretty good recommendations on how we need to move forward. Out of those recommendations, what do you think should be the number one priority and the number two priority for the government to consider at this point in time in our procurement processes?
Senior Analyst, Security and Defence, Conference of Defence Associations Institute
Their rank is the order in which they're listed.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake, MB
Okay, follow it through and run with it that way.
We were talking about capabilities. As you mentioned, we have exported some of our capabilities in doing equipment upgrades, as we've done with the frigates with New Zealand. As we move forward, when we look at the joint strike fighter, and yes, everything is in limbo here in Canada, but have we not already seen benefits from...? Rather than it being strictly on industrial and regional benefits, going through the new process that was adopted by the joint strike fighter, are we seeing procurement opportunities for Canadian aerospace industries that are working with the coalition at this point in time?
Senior Analyst, Security and Defence, Conference of Defence Associations Institute
Yes, absolutely. I believe, just off the top of my head—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Peter Kent
If I could interrupt for a moment, I see the flashing lights that are calling us to a vote back on the Hill within 30 minutes. Perhaps you could briefly answer the question before we adjourn.
Senior Analyst, Security and Defence, Conference of Defence Associations Institute
Sure.
Absolutely yes on the benefits; off the top of my head, I believe it's about $1 billion already.
Conservative
Conservative