I had mine off.
Evidence of meeting #77 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 tool.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #77 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 tool.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5 p.m.
Bloc
Christine Normandin Bloc Saint-Jean, QC
I think the interpretation is back, but for a moment, there was none.
5 p.m.
Liberal
Chad Collins Liberal Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
Am I good to go? Okay. Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Back to the force structure model, on the reductions that our constituents and our committee members and other parliamentarians can use in terms of those sliding scales, I was someone who had to live through that political fad known as “defund the police”. I had the opportunity to work with our police chief in terms of the calls for a 20% reduction in the police service. At my request, the chief came forward to show what a 20% reduction would look like. If we had had that sliding scale during that time period, a lot of people might have used the model and the interactive model that has been placed online and made available to us.
What I found when that 20% reduction report came forward was that it was not as simple as just a 1:1 ratio. If you wanted to decrease the police budget by 20%, it meant much more, from a service-reduction perspective, than just a 20% cut. If you were to take, for instance, 20% of the workforce out of commission, it would mean a 35% to 40% reduction in services to the community.
I could go through the list. We don't have time today, but I could give examples of the services that residents would live without because of that.
Mr. Chair, I'd like to ask our delegation this. If I were to ask someone in the service who's dealing with budgets whether it's as simple as just sliding the scale 20% one way or 10% another way and whether that accurately reflects the options that are available to those who create our budgets and deliver our services, would those who answer the question say that it's not that simple?
Can you comment on that in terms of the accuracy of using that sliding scale? You've tried and I think at times struggled to relate to us how you've modelled this. It's very complex. It's just not that simple, so could you comment on that?
5:05 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer
Certainly. If one were to look at the tool and try to use it to determine how easy or difficult it would be to decrease the budget of National Defence by a number of billions, I don't think the tool is intended to do that.
Somebody who would want to reduce spending at DND, for example, would probably want to do a much deeper dive than just using a calculator or a tool. The tool is meant to provide an idea of how much it would cost to increase capabilities or decrease capabilities for specific military objectives, but to carry out a fulsome budget exercise, whether it be increasing funding or decreasing funding, I hope people would use something much more refined than a calculator.
It's intended to provide a tool and information for parliamentarians, but it's not meant to be used as the basis for decision-making when it comes to deciding where or how to increase or decrease funding at DND.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
Chad Collins Liberal Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
This whole exercise is based on budget numbers. If it's not for the purposes of the trade-offs.... I think “trade-offs” was the best word you had in your report in terms of accurately describing what these tools allow us to do. If you increase in one area, you're forced, I think, in other areas to decrease in order to meet whatever the budget number is for a specific year or past years.
I'm not certain how to rationalize our use of these tools if it's not to try to determine whether to enhance services in one or more areas, and when you do that, there are dominoes that fall the other way. You're taking money out of one area to add to another, and there are implications. I don't think you get any detailed information in this exercise that informs you—whoever you are, whoever's using these sliding scales—about the implications of making whatever changes are in your mind when you're playing with this online tool you've provided.
5:05 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer
You can certainly use the tool to make these trade-offs. What I meant and didn't say is that you also have to look at what you want to do with the forces. If you want to increase, for strategic reasons, some types of capabilities, you also have to look at what you want to do with your defence policy. That is what I didn't say but what I meant.
The tool is very useful in determining the trade-offs, but you have to do that keeping in mind that it will have geopolitical and policy implications. The tool is obviously not built to do that.
Doing a reduction or an expansion exercise will be possible to do with the tool—how much it would cost you or how much it would free up in terms of resources—but it doesn't take into account the other considerations. That is what I should have said and I didn't say in my previous answer.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you, Mr. Collins.
Before Mr. Bezan moves his motion, the chair has a question.
After the combat ships and maybe the F-35s, the largest single expenditure is going to be on the NORAD modernization, particularly the over-the-horizon radar. That strikes me as tailed or indirect rather than direct because there is no lethality to that capability, yet without that capability, the lethality is rendered useless.
In your direct-indirect analysis, does that go into the indirect pile and not the direct pile? If it does, then will that move the numbers around, if you will, or skew the numbers once again?
5:10 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer
If you're talking about the F-35s and the new warships, these would both be direct. There would be some indirect costs associated with that, obviously, like the support that these ships would need such as the refuelling at sea. It's the same with the fighter jets—the refuelling in the air.
The F-35s themselves and the warships would add to the tooth part, so the capabilities.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
The over-the-horizon radar and the costs of NORAD modernization, the siting of all of the new ability to detect threat, that's indirect.
5:10 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer
Generally speaking, reconnaissance is indirect, although it can vary on the specifics.
I am not being kicked under the table, so that means—
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
On a point of order, just before we close, Mr. Penney indicated that he knew this $15 billion black hole wasn't some worm in outer space. He knows what we're referring to.
Could he provide us with a response of whether or not they found it, and if they found it, what it was used for?
5:10 p.m.
Advisor-Analyst, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer
I'm glad I'm put on the spot. I recall this issue being raised at the time. I recall doing analysis on it. I don't have the answer with me to relay to you.
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
5:10 p.m.
Advisor-Analyst, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer
I absolutely can, and I will.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
I have another question, but we are running out of time and Mr. Bezan is getting quite anxious.
On behalf of the committee, I want to thank you for your testimony. You've given us a lot to think about. In fact, sometimes it's quite perplexing.
We appreciate not only your contribution to this committee but to the functioning of Parliament. I'm not sure whether you fall quite into the category of essential service, but you certainly approach essential service. It makes our jobs much more informed and allows us to make decisions.
Thank you, all three of you, for your contributions.
Go ahead, Mr. Bezan.
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to move the following motion, which I gave notice of on October 2. I move:
That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the almost-one-billion dollar cuts to the Canadian Armed Forces and the impact this will have; that the committee hold a minimum of three meetings on the topic; that the committee invite the President of the Treasury Board, the Minister of National Defence, and the Chief of the Defence Staff to appear before the committee; and that the committee report its findings and recommendations to the House.
If I can just speak to that for a minute, as we know, it was announced that the government is going to find almost a billion dollars. The Liberals have asked the Department of National Defence to find those monies, and we had the chief of the defence staff here saying that this was going to have a very large impact on the operations of the Canadian Armed Forces. As he said at committee, he's had some “very difficult” conversations with the commanding officers of all three services—air force, army and navy—and they are having trouble communicating this back to their people. That's a direct quote.
I would say that, based upon the concerns that are being raised by the Canadian Armed Forces, based upon the efforts that are supposed to be made to get Canada to the NATO 2% metric, knowing that we just got a note this week that the public accounts have been tabled with Parliament and that last year the budget lapsed another $1.5 billion in defence spending and knowing that $2.5 billion lapsed in the previous year, a total of over $10 billion has now been cut from our Canadian Armed Forces and those dollars aren't being reinvested back in.
The government has always talked the game, but their actions speak louder than words, and I don't believe that Prime Minister Trudeau is at all interested in supporting our troops or making our Canadian Armed Forces more capable in light of the very dangerous world we live in, especially, as we saw in today's headline, with General Eyre talking about how Russia and China “consider themselves to be at war with the West” and that includes us as Canada. If we are under that level of threat—never mind what's going on in the Middle East with the war in Israel against the terrorist organization Hamas, and never mind our responsibilities to NATO on the eastern flank in Latvia and to help our allies in Ukraine—we need to make sure these cuts that the Liberals are bringing down on the Canadian Armed Forces are not undermining our ability and capability.
5:15 p.m.
Liberal
Marie-France Lalonde Liberal Orléans, ON
I know that time is running out, but I would really like to suspend. I have two members and we just need to.... Overall, I think we are somewhat comfortable with the intent of the motion. There are aspects where we would propose amendments. I would just ask the chair to suspend for a minute.
5:15 p.m.
Liberal