Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank Dr. Ellis for that insight. He's someone who has served and who understands what military housing was and what it's become. I think it's great to have that on the record.
I'd just add to this. I know that those who serve in the Canadian Armed Forces expect that when they're deployed, particularly for those in the army, when they go to places, even like Latvia, sometimes they have to be put up in tents for a few months. When they're at home at the base, you would think they would be able to live in a nice home.
We heard from the Canadian Forces housing authority, when they were here, that they're building fewer than 20 new homes a year, yet we have a wait-list of over 4,500 members who currently want to have residential housing units provided by National Defence. That is by no means ever going to keep up. We know that the budget the Canadian Forces housing authority has to upgrade the current homes isn't keeping up with the challenge that we have with the housing stock that continues to age.
To the amendment, on taking out the name of the Minister of National Defence from the motion, we heard from the defence ombudsman, Mr. Lick, in response to a question from Mr. Fillmore on Monday that it is a Treasury Board Secretariat guideline that ultimately comes into play, but it's done at the discretion of the Minister of National Defence. The minister has the cabinet authority to say no and to actually cancel that rent increase and allow rents to be frozen at their current rate, which was set in 2023.
I would again suggest that taking out the Minister of National Defence is not accurate because, ultimately, under our parliamentary processes we have ministerial authority and responsibility. The minister is responsible for this department, including the Canadian Forces housing authority and including the rent hikes that are going to come into effect on April 1, so I do argue against the amendment to remove his name.
I would also argue that by adding “pursuant to Standing Order 109” to the motion.... For those who aren't familiar with parliamentary processes, what the Liberal parliamentary secretary is trying to do is shut down debate from ever happening on this motion in the House, because it does kill concurrence. The ability to have these motions go to the House and have a concurrence motion allows other members beyond this committee to actually come to the House and participate in a three-hour debate—essentially a take-note debate—on this crisis.
I think this is a crisis that we should address, especially for those who are right now without proper housing in Halifax, where they just recently had another three-plus feet of snow dumped on them. My heart breaks knowing that they are sitting out there literally in the cold, dealing with wet, heavy snow. We know that tents collapse under that. For those living in their cars, they could realistically be trapped in those vehicles because of the heavy snow that's fallen on them. We've seen places with up to five feet of snow.
I think it's unfortunate that there is a push from the parliamentary secretary to undermine what the motion has set out to do, which is to cancel the rent increase—to direct the Minister of National Defence, who is responsible for this department and for these rent increases, to cancel them—and to give the opportunity for other members who aren't part of this committee to have a fulsome debate in the House of Commons.