Evidence of meeting #36 for National Defence in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was capabilities.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Charles Sousa
Thank you, Ms. Exner-Pirot. I appreciate your time and look forward to your report.
We're going to proceed now to our first round of questions.
We're going to start with Ms. Cheryl Gallant.
You have up to six minutes.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Algonquin—Renfrew—Pembroke, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair. All my questions will be through you.
Dr. Huebert, I was a bit late for your speech at the Battle of the Atlantic event in Ottawa a little while ago. You said something about the world being at a certain point in history. Could you tell me what exactly you said and why you said it?
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
I believe the geopolitical indicators we've had since at least 2008 have shown us that we are moving into an international area where the use of force at great power levels is becoming an increasing possibility.
What I was talking about at the Battle of the Atlantic event is the manner in which we can no longer pretend that the end of history has basically eliminated the possibility of war between great powers that will include Canada. Therefore, Canada needs to get out of this mindset that simply doing enough in terms of what our allies say, such as meeting 2% of GDP in terms of our defence...is no longer good enough. We have to be thinking in terms of what we need for military capabilities to actually deter, and to be prepared to fight if that deterrence breaks down.
In the international geopolitical environment, we look at the directions the Chinese, Russians and even Americans have taken, which have given the probability of conflict a huge increase, unfortunately.
Conservative
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
I believe we need to be thinking in that context.
The types of technologies and the fact that we have lagged so badly in this context.... If we are not thinking about how we engage in war, I'm afraid the timelines that are often being discussed, that we will have a particular piece of kit by 2030 or 2035.... That mindset does not prepare us to provide for the best form of deterrence to ensure that our adversaries are dissuaded and that, should that deterrence break down, we are able to make that shift. You can't do that overnight, not with the industries and not with the technologies. Therefore, we need to get into that mindset today.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Algonquin—Renfrew—Pembroke, ON
What would Canada on a war footing look like? What would be different about life in Canada? What would we see that would be different?
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
We need, first of all, to have an ongoing discussion on how we truly defend Canada. It can't be something where we turn around, from a societal perspective, and say, “Okay, we've met our 2%; now let's get on to some domestic issue, and we don't have to come back to this context.”
We need to have a societal change in terms of awareness. We need to be aware of the potential for an actual great power conflict to the same level we were at one point in understanding environmental security threats. I think Canadians truly started to appreciate the danger coming from climate change, which is not to say that it has in any way gone away or been solved. It's to get at society.
The second part is the political elite. Political elites need to understand that we are in a different geopolitical environment. This has to be a day-to-day frontline consideration almost on everything that you are doing in that context.
We also have to realize the manner in which we have allowed most of the forces' capability to basically atrophy. We need to be saying, “We need to do this as quickly as possible”, except that means mistakes will be made.
We need to start getting out of the mindset that once we solve an issue, like getting the fighter replacement, that's only the beginning. We need to be thinking in terms of how we do replacements when we take losses. We need to be thinking in terms of how we replace pilots when there are losses. We need to change that element of how we are preparing going forward.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Algonquin—Renfrew—Pembroke, ON
Dr. Leuprecht, we're on the verge of an announcement of a decision on our submarine procurement. The government seems to be waiting to see how much it can get out of the other one.
Is this the way procurement should be run? Should it be based on the industrial benefits for one region versus another?
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada and Queen's University, As an Individual
Ms. Gallant, I think my statement was pretty clear about where the priorities need to be in this country. I worry deeply about the continued delays.
This is a great opportunity. For instance, one of the two options would ensure that Canada is part of the largest conventional submarine fleet in the world. The other option does not provide that opportunity. It provides what I would say is a reasonably outdated piece of equipment that was built with German technology from one generation ago. The Canadian Armed Forces also need submarines, so these are ultimately political choices that we need to make.
We need an announcement and a decision, and we need to stop walking back decisions once we make them.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Algonquin—Renfrew—Pembroke, ON
That would apply to the F-35 as well, then.
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada and Queen's University, As an Individual
When it comes to the maritime, air and aerospace domains, not being interoperable with the United States is not an option for either continental defence or the value added that we provide to the alliance. Only one of the planes is a fifth-generation fighter that offers us that opportunity.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Algonquin—Renfrew—Pembroke, ON
Thank you.
Dr. Shimooka, do you have the sense that the government is trying to provoke the United States to cancel or suspend the F-35s, as it did with Turkey, without doing so on its own?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
I don't believe that's the case. The continued purchase of aircraft through the long-lead item.... The structure of the joint strike fighter program requires you to make incremental purchases year on year. Those have continued, as reporting and U.S. budget documents have suggested.
I don't think that's necessarily the case. I believe, as I stated in my last committee testimony, that this is being used as part of leverage. To Dr. Leuprecht's point, I don't believe there is a doubt within the Royal Canadian Air Force, as the commander of the air force stated a couple of months ago, that this is the option it needs. It is moving forward, and those plans seem to be moving forward, yet the political statement that should undergird all of this has not been made by the government.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Charles Sousa
Thank you.
I'm sorry, Ms. Gallant.
Mr. Watchorn, it's over to you for six minutes.
Liberal
Tim Watchorn Liberal Les Pays-d'en-Haut, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I would like to thank all the witnesses for joining us today.
I'll focus on the defence industrial strategy. Last week, I had the opportunity to join the Prime Minister at the opening of Nouveau Monde Graphite's Matawinie mine. I would call this a perfect example of how the strategy can benefit society, interactions with indigenous peoples and mining production.
Nouveau Monde Graphite's Matawinie mine began production last week. We've been working on the project for some time. It involves the Quebec government, the Canadian government and local communities. The mine is a socially acceptable project. The Manawan indigenous communities were actively involved in the early stages of the project.
As part of this project, a processing plant will be built in Bécancour. The Canadian government has set aside a strategic reserve of 30,000 tonnes of graphite for commercial or military applications that may be required in the future.
I find another aspect of the mine's opening absolutely fascinating. The Manawan region has been badly hit by softwood lumber tariffs. Yet it was encouraging to see young people from the softwood lumber industry heading to work for the future mine. These young people have well‑paid jobs. This also helps maintain the local vitality of the industry.
Ms. Exner‑Pirot, do you think that this project reflects the objectives of the defence industrial strategy?
Can you provide an example or two of projects that could get off the ground in the coming years?
Director, Energy, Natural Resources and Environment, Macdonald-Laurier Institute
For committee members who don't know, graphite is listed as one of the critical minerals on the NATO list, and Canada has a good supply. It's an obvious fit that we should be the ones to increase production. I think there's a good case for public sector support to make that happen, and we've been able to bring supply on fairly quickly. There are obviously other uses for graphite, including in battery supply chains. In general, I am in favour of it.
There's always a risk, so we should always be attuned to the risk that these become uneconomic and just purely subsidized. If there isn't enough offtake, on the other hand, and no one is using the product, it becomes a waste of money vis-à-vis other opportunities we may have had. I'm not saying this is so in this specific circumstance, but any circumstance will have that risk, so we have to make sure we have the proper frameworks and the proper assessment of which projects to fund and where they go.
The mining is maybe the easy part for Canada. The second level where I think we need more attention and where maybe it's a bit trickier is in the initial refining and chemical processing of many of these metals. I have a little list, which will be in my report, of things that seem clear to me where Canada should either play a role or ensure we're supporting our allies to play a role. They are rare earth separation, graphite spheroidization, gallium recovery and refining, antimony refining, high-purity germanium refining and niobium alloying. I'm sure this list exists somewhere in the committee, DND or NRCan. I hope those lists exist. Again, I appreciate why they wouldn't be made public.
When we say “critical minerals”, I know we're not talking about sophistication yet. When we say, “NATO's list of 12 minerals”, again, that's not a level of sophistication. When we start to talk about specific phases of processing and refining and specific end uses and end-users, that's when I know we'll have finally reached such a level of sophistication that, in the event we need a war footing, as Dr. Huebert says, we would be in a position to provide materials into those systems.
Liberal
Tim Watchorn Liberal Les Pays-d'en-Haut, QC
Thank you.
I would just like to say more about the graphite mine. It already has contracts with Panasonic and Italian companies to make batteries and for other uses of graphite. So I think that this constitutes an excellent example of how the strategy can work.
I always like to talk about issues close to my constituency. Manawan isn't that far from my constituency. It's about two hours away. We're lucky to have Mirabel. We've already talked about this at other times in the committee.
I would like Mr. Shimooka to tell us about the drone manufacturing hub. At the start of the meeting, I think that Mr. Huebert spoke about the need to contact our partners who already have military commitments. I know for certain that the people making proposals for the drone hub in Mirabel have direct contact with people in Ukraine and that they're putting their experience to good use to produce state‑of‑the‑art drones. Mirabel is also fortunate to have controlled airspace, a control tower and a significantly underused runway. So, the potential is there.
I would like Mr. Shimooka to share how he finds that the hubs used by industry, academia and the governments can make a positive impact on the development of quality drones and equipment.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Charles Sousa
Unfortunately, we've run out of time. I would ask you to please save the response, as we're proceeding to Monsieur Savard-Tremblay.
It's over to you for six minutes.
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank all our witnesses today for their participation and remarks.
Mr. Huebert, you appeared before the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology in November 2025. You said at the time that Canada's defence industrial strategy was primarily a political process. Yet the document wasn't yet available at the time of your appearance. So it remained hypothetical.
Now that it's available, do you still maintain the same cautionary position, or rather the same finding?
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
Absolutely. When I go through the document and trace through the five pillars, I can see they are provided in the way these documents have ultimately always provided them. You get little one-way arrows for what it sees as the variables being connected, but it provides government with no guidance whatsoever on addressing the issue that has been at the heart of how we have made almost all our major political decisions regarding a procurement.
The question in my mind goes back to a couple of points that Christian and Richard were making. Unlike our Nordic allies, which made the decision to procure the F-35 in relatively short order, how do we understand the factors in Canada—our industrial policy or whatever it was—that caused the F-35 to still be a non-decision? How did we make the decision to basically divide the replacement for the Sea Kings into two different directions, where there are growing criticisms of the choice that was made for the navy as opposed to the Coast Guard? What does the policy tell us? How does it help us?
I'm reflecting on the last question about the drone centre. My question, from an industrial policy perspective, is always about how the Ukrainians, from the point of being invaded in 2014, took a warfighting technology into a battlefield—the use of drones. I'm wondering what the political techniques were that made them able to come together and say, “This is something we have to look at. We're fighting a war. We have to get the resources.” All of a sudden, they're getting the types of tactical victories we're seeing reported in the press. Does our industrial strategy provide us with any guidance that follows how the Ukrainians were able to do that?
We can talk about Mirabel. We can talk about the unity of connections. However, it still comes back to this: How do you do that in a warfighting environment? I don't think the strategy provides us with any guidance in any of the pillars on how you do that and on what the role is of the politicians or the political elites to assure that we are able to copy what the Ukrainians were able to do in that context.
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC
You spoke about speed. This also echoes another aspect of your remarks to the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology last November. You talked about the quick purchase of C‑17 military aircraft.
Let's compare this to the Royal Canadian Navy's helicopter replacement program. You described it as an example of a very bad approach.
You spoke of the defence industrial strategy document, which is quite recent.
How could such different results be generated by a common entity, which is the same government? Why is that?
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
Well, that's the problem: We don't have the proper insights that have to come with a functioning critical ability to look at evergreen processes and to understand these policies.
I'll return to Canada's shipbuilding strategy. That was brought forward as an example of how to do these types of procurements. There was a general acceptance that it was a bipartisan approach to addressing the issue that has always plagued Canadian shipbuilding for both the navy and Coast Guard: How do you avoid building everything at once and in the most expensive way and instead spread it out so that you retain the technology and you do not run into this boom-and-bust cycle?
Of course, everybody accepted that it was a good process. It seemed to make sense in terms of dividing things between the two coastlines, but we had a political process where we added a third shipbuilding centre. There has been no good reflection, really, on how come we moved away from what the shipbuilding strategy said.
Of course, I'll point out that we are now building for the Coast Guard—as we should have been doing since 1985, when we first said we were going to do it—three different classes of big icebreakers at the same time in four different shipyards. In other words, everything that the shipbuilding strategy said we should not do, we are doing. I'm asking why we don't have an understanding of how come that has occurred so that in moving forward with the industrial defence strategy, we are not simply replicating the political factors that came forward that basically said to the shipbuilding strategy, “Hey, don't do this”, and then we're doing this. Why did that occur? That is my question to you.
Bloc
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC
Good.
You're describing some fairly significant shortcomings in the process. Yet the industrial strategy promises to increase serviceability to 75% for the navy, 80% for the army and 85% for the air force. These are extremely high targets. Given the shortcomings described, is all this realistic?