Mr. Ruff, thank you for your service, and thank you for your words today.
I think it is important to talk about how this decision was made by veterans. More than 10,000 people responded to that survey. I'm reading from a story from CTV last year when that decision was made:
They overwhelmingly preferred a design put forward by Team Stimson: a circular space inspired by an Indigenous medicine wheel, sectioned into four parts, with an inner sanctuary featuring four bronze flak jackets hanging from crosses.
Artist Adrian Stimson, a member of Siksika First Nation in Alberta, is perhaps uniquely qualified to create such a monument.
A former member of the Armed Forces, Stimson joined the Canadian Forces Artists Program as a civilian in 2010 and spent time in Afghanistan, observing how the troops lived and interacted with their surroundings.
“While I was there, I became interested in the physical materiality of the bases, the industrial nature of embedding troops into the theatre of war.... Mimicking this, the monument is a place to be discovered and to be revealed. The monument enlivens as you approach on a meandering pathway, revealing itself slowly, with purpose.”
Three quadrants of the monument will include the names of the 158 Canadian military members who were killed in the conflict. The fourth...is meant to honour Canada's relationship with the Afghan people.
I think it's important that we recognize that it wasn't political interference; it was the government listening to veterans themselves. I think we should keep that in mind. The veterans do want us to move on to other issues. They want us to build this monument and move on to talking about many of the other issues that Mr. Ruff brought up, which are important as well.
Thank you, Chair.