Science and Research Committee on June 1st, 2026

[Wendy Hadwen]

The agenda is based on the implementation of Canada's defence industrial strategy, which means it covers all topics addressed in the strategy, ranging from barriers to securing research to security clearances—including the deployment of our sovereign capabilities.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC]

I fully understand.

Will the council's recommendations, advice or proceedings be made public?

[Wendy Hadwen]

The council is still in its early stages, and—

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC]

So that isn't known.

[Wendy Hadwen]

No, that's not it.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC]

The list was just received today, and a decision will be made later on as to whether or not information about the public consultations will be made public. That is my understanding.

[Wendy Hadwen]

Was there a question?

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC]

Will it be made public?

[Wendy Hadwen]

We've begun the work, but it's—

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC]

Ms. Hadwen, there are two possible answers: “yes” and “no”.

[Wendy Hadwen]

Of course, transparency is important to us.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC]

Which is why you never released the list. It's up to me, at this committee meeting, to ask you for that list today.

But you're unable to tell me why you didn't post it on the website. So much for transparency.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Tony Baldinelli]

I'm going to have to stop you there.

We're going to go to MP Lawton now for five minutes of questions.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. You're doing a bang-up job in your role. I appreciate that.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

Ms. Hadwen, you had referred in your opening statements to the increase in defence spending relative to Canada's NATO commitment and the intersection that has with the dual use policy and the broader defence strategy. I would like to build off that for a moment.

I'm assuming you're aware that we have learned through Order Paper questions and other government information that over $10 billion of the so-called new federal spending on defence is actually just reclassified money that the government was already spending on things on infrastructure, pensions and the Coast Guard. Are you aware of that?

[Wendy Hadwen]

In order to get to 2% this year, there was an additional $9 billion. That money was invested in four key areas. I'm only able to speak to it because I was part of the technical briefs for that.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

I'll just be more specific.

Are you aware that some of the government's stated increases in defence spending have actually just been reclassification of existing government spending?

[Wendy Hadwen]

What I am aware of is how hard we work to move spending that we had in mind for the future into the present. We accelerated some things that were in planning.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

I apologize. Just a yes or no. Are you aware of this? If the answer is yes, I can ask about that. If the answer is no, I can ask about that. I'm just not getting an answer to the question.

[Wendy Hadwen]

I'm sorry, Mr. Chair.

What I can say is that we moved spending that we had planned for the future into the present.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

Okay.

[Wendy Hadwen]

We brought forward things that were in planning. We either did more, that's the infrastructure spending, or we did—

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

I'll ask the question in a different way.

Is there any spending the government is lumping under the NATO spending category that previously would not have been in that category? Is there any spending the government is now saying is defence spending, that percentage of the GDP, that a year ago would not have been construed as that?

Okay, the answer is yes. I was just hoping you'd acknowledge that. That's fine.

The concern I have about the dual use strategy is that when we are looking at things that can serve civilian needs and also defence needs, I feel we are moving more towards a direction where it's easier to have these blurred lines where a program or acquisition that isn't actually increasing our defence capability, and isn't actually increasing our security capability, is being classified as that. It is being used to basically artificially inflate a number.

I don't know if anyone is willing to answer this. What's being done to ensure that we aren't doing that and that dual use actually has a defence component that increases what we want our defence system to be able to do?

[Wendy Hadwen]

Mr. Chair, if it's okay with you, I'll start, and ask Kate to follow up.

For us, the key element of the defence industrial strategy is the 10 sovereign capabilities. For the first time ever, you have the Department of National Defence being very public about its demand signal. That is in response to what we heard from industry in the course of the development of the strategy, which was a very strong interest in understanding what we needed. This is the beginning of our attempt to clarify where we have a need, and that sets the stage, then, for the dual-use aspect of it.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

We've had the Prime Minister talk about telecommunication systems, airports, critical mineral infrastructure. These are all very important things, but these are not going to help our soldiers have the tools they need on the front lines, as submarines and aircraft are. What's being done to ensure these vaunted increases to our defence spending are actually increases in our military capacity as a country?

[Wendy Hadwen]

There is a significant chapter on supply chain in the defence industrial strategy, because we know the size of the country, and the requirement to have a bigger defence presence in Canada calls on us to be more clear about our needs in terms of supply chains.