Evidence of meeting #71 for National Defence in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was housing.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you, Ms. Gallant.
Mr. May, you have the final five minutes. Welcome back to the committee.
Before you start your questioning, I want to thank you, on behalf of the committee, for your work in the last two years. You contributed mightily to the functioning of this committee, which I think functions at a pretty high level. I know that you did a lot of work, and I just wanted to publicly acknowledge your last two years. Thanks.
You won't get that every day.
September 28th, 2023 / 4:30 p.m.
Liberal
Bryan May Liberal Cambridge, ON
Wow. I don't know what to say to that, other than I hope that doesn't count against my time, Mr. Chair.
Liberal
Bryan May Liberal Cambridge, ON
I am very pleased to be subbing in for a very capable new parliamentary secretary who wasn't able to be here.
Thank you for that, Mr. Chair. I'm going to have to clip that. We're going to put that out there for posterity.
To go back to you, Minister, your first question from Mr. Bezan alluded to some potentially good news. I would like to hear that good news regarding recruitment and retention from General Eyre, if that's possible.
Liberal
Bill Blair Liberal Scarborough Southwest, ON
It is. I think the fact that we've reversed the trend.... The general, in the next hour.... I might suggest that the best use of the time is to let him use that hour, but we've reversed the trend. In fact, the number of people joining is now exceeding, for the first time in nearly three years, the attrition, the people who are leaving. That is good news. I think it is reflective of some really outstanding work that the Canadian Armed Forces and our recruiting teams have been doing across the country.
I'm going to take a moment for two things.
In 2025 is the next supply ship. I got you an answer. I tried to get you an answer as quickly as possible.
Can I also just take a moment? I don't want to take it from his time, but I also wanted to thank Bryan for his exceptional work.
Even when I was named as the new Minister of National Defence, he spent a lot of time with me. He talked to me about his many visits to bases and wings right across the country, and he shared with me what he heard. It was incredibly important. I just wanted to acknowledge that. His heart is in this. He has been an incredible advocate for the Canadian Armed Forces in our government. I'm hoping he'll continue to be so.
Thank you.
Liberal
Bryan May Liberal Cambridge, ON
Thank you, Minister. That was very special.
He's going to start calling for time now....
Liberal
Bryan May Liberal Cambridge, ON
I wanted to talk a bit about—and you've alluded to this—how a number of us had an amazing opportunity to travel overseas this past summer to the U.K. and to Latvia, Poland and Estonia to visit with a number of our troops over there. Everywhere we went, our partners and allies said that they wanted more Canada.
You've said a bit about it already today, but maybe you can elaborate on Canada's contributions to international peace and security on the international stage, not just in Europe but also in the Indo-Pacific.
Liberal
Bill Blair Liberal Scarborough Southwest, ON
I think we've all heard the call from our NATO allies, for example, and from some of our Five Eyes partners, about the need to increase Canada's capabilities and participation in the region. What I've observed—I went and visited them as well, Bryan—is that, God bless them, our people are punching way above their weight.
I had the opportunity, like all of you did, to go to Lydd—well, some of you did—and see the work of our armed forces members: privates and corporals and sergeants training Ukrainian recruits. You could see the way in which they did that. It would take your breath away. It made me so proud of the work they were doing. Watching those Ukrainian soldiers get on the bus and head off to the front was also cause for you to just choke.... You couldn't care about people if you weren't really moved by that.
What I have heard.... I've spoken to the defence minister in Latvia, for example. They are so proud of and pleased with the Canadian commitment in their country in that enhanced forward presence. They've said.... Actually, the defence minister told me that the Canadian flag is the most popular flag in his country right now. That's directly because of the Canadian Armed Forces. That's the men and women of the forces that are causing that pride in our country.
Let me be very clear. We have to do more, and we are going to do more. CAF has already made a commitment to increase the brigade strength in Latvia. We're also much in demand in a number of other regions. You talked about Poland, Estonia, the U.K. and other places. We are going to do more, but the men and women we've already deployed are making it a lot easier and, frankly, they're increasing the demand for our service there.
Liberal
Bryan May Liberal Cambridge, ON
I'm pretty sure that I'm getting close on time, but I'll use the rest of my time to simply say thank you to all of my colleagues here on the committee. Regardless of political stripe, this was an amazing group to be working with.
Thank you to Minister Anand and thank you to you, Minister Blair, but also, thank you to the people behind us. The staff team with National Defence were just top notch and amazing to work with.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you.
It gives me great pleasure to cut you off one last time, Mr. May.
Colleagues, that brings us to the end of the minister's hour with us.
On behalf of the committee, I want to thank you for your time here, Minister Blair. You've made several offers to the committee to co-operate and to review various priorities and, possibly, legislation. It would be my intention and, I'm sure, the committee's intention to take you up on that, and we'd probably like to do it sooner rather than later. We will, by some means or another, schedule some sort of working group so that we can work toward the goal we all have, which is to have the best military services that this nation is entitled to.
Again, thank you, and we look forward to your next appearance.
Liberal
Bill Blair Liberal Scarborough Southwest, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all the members for their warm welcome. Very sincerely, I am looking forward to working with you all. I think we share the same purpose—
Conservative
Liberal
Bill Blair Liberal Scarborough Southwest, ON
Scheduling permitting, I'll come back as quickly as possible.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
I call the meeting back to order.
Welcome. We'll start with our questions.
Mr. Kelly, you have five minutes.
Conservative
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
Thank you.
I'm going to start. I don't know if this question is for Mr. Matthews or General Eyre, but how many 155-millimetre shells are being produced in Canada right now per month?
Conservative
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
All right. They are now producing shells.
What is the production capability of that facility? What can we realistically get up to quickly?
Bill Matthews Deputy Minister, Department of National Defence
I'll start, Mr. Chair, and the chief will chime in.
The conversation about upgrading production of ammunition—155-millimetre or other—is a long process that requires investment. There are discussions under way about potentially investing to upgrade production, but it is not a quick fix.
