Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure and honour to debate Bill C-300, an act respecting the establishment and award of the Canadian volunteer service medal and clasp for United Nations peacekeeping to Canadians serving with the United Nations peacekeeping force. The award as envisaged by the promoter of the bill does not restrict itself merely to those who serve in traditional armed forces capacities but also would include people involved in peacekeeping areas such as policing, local administration, the delivery of aid, medical assistance or even election assistance.
I want to speak to this bill because I strongly support it. The bill is a well thought out initiative that recognizes the realities of the future. We know that the world is changing. We know we are entering a new era. Increasingly we see signs that peacekeeping in the wider sense, not just the traditional sense, will become a more and more important function of our armed forces and many other armed forces in the world.
We have traditionally focused our recognition and awards on traditional combat roles and traditional war theatres. It is time to update some of the recognition and awards. Domestically we are prepared to have medals and recognition that are more appropriate to the future roles that is seen for our armed forces.
In speaking in favour of this bill I would like to pay tribute to the member for Saanich-Gulf Islands very briefly. He has brought this bill forward and is one of my colleagues who is retiring at the end of this Parliament. I want to pay tribute to him for bringing this bill forward. He was a distinguished member of the armed forces who has been a great help to us. It has been a pleasure for all of us on both sides of the House to have him here. He is closing out his career by participating in the ultimate phoney war back and forth across the House of Commons and has been willing to act as our deputy whip, perhaps also to engage in his last peacekeeping assignment.
The bill has an interesting history, as other members have pointed out. For some time voices have been calling for this kind of award.
In the last Parliament this initiative was supported through the introduction of two private members' bills. The House of Commons Standing Committee on National Defence and Veterans Affairs called for the establishment of a Canadian volunteer service medal for United Nations peacekeeping. That committee was made up of the Liberal Party, now the present government, the Progressive Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party. Those were commitments which those parties made in a unanimous report. Endorsement for this has come from the Canadian Peacekeeping Veterans Association and the Canadian Association of the United Nations Peacekeeping Chapter.
Other countries already have similar awards: Belgium, the Netherlands, Ireland, Ghana and, of course, the United States.
I could go on to mention the various groups that have pressed for this award: many members of the government, all parties, past and present, municipalities and petitioners. I will not dwell too much on that because I have a limited amount of time and I want to speak about other issues.
Mr. Speaker, I have a base in my riding which is being gradually relocated to your city. I am sure that is a coincidence on your part. However, the base is being relocated. During my time as a member of Parliament, having the military in my riding has given me a chance to deal with military personnel on a wide range of issues, including their experiences with peacekeeping assignments.
In my dealings with the military I have always been impressed with their commitment to their various engagements, including their peacekeeping engagements. In that context I want to express my concern about the previous failure to approve this bill. I hope that this time the government will approve it.
Bill C-258 was a non-votable bill when it was introduced by the hon. member for Saanich-Gulf Islands in the last session. As a non-votable bill the official representatives of the ministry spoke against it for what I consider to be the flimsiest of reasons. Basically the excuse was that Government House has a process for this and that process should be followed, that there is a decorations committee which has a process and that the United Nations has a process and we are partly involved in that process. They were all excuses based on these processes.
It amazes me how fast the government is to send people into conflict and how slow it is to recognize their contributions, whether it is in wartime or in peacekeeping missions. Reading over the debates from this session and from the last session when we debated Bill C-258, one is really struck by the glacial speed at which governments make decisions to recognize the contributions of our military.
Dieppe, Hong Kong, the merchant marine: we are talking about coming to terms with the full recognition of some of these activities a full 45 to 50 years after the events. In the case of Somalia, we have dragged our heels both in recognizing the contributions our peacekeepers made and also in finding out exactly what happened during the unfortunate incidents which occurred there. Of course, in that process the reputation of everyone who served has been tainted.
We are tremendously slow in dealing with the real contributions that military people make, yet not only are we quick to send them, we are quick to mobilize the resources of the state to make sure that the contributions of a handful of people are always recognized. The Prime Minister is recognized when he is at the United Nations or when he calls the President of the United States. He is getting the best publicity for his contribution. Our diplomats are being fully recognized. We have had some outstanding generals who have played particular roles in these missions. We make sure that they receive their full recognition and honour here in the House or at Government House or wherever else. However, we have been consistently slow in recognizing the real contribution of our military people. These people go into these situations, often risking their lives. In many cases they are dangerously under-equipped, assuming not just the risk of the mission but additional risks imposed on them by the general mismanagement of our armed forces over the past 20 years.
I have always been impressed by the fact that whenever one of these missions is called or conceived-somebody's brainchild somewhere-at how quickly the military people are to get their bags packed, to come out saying publicly from the general right on down to the private that they are ready to do, they feel confident and they are looking forward to the challenge.
Everyone who deals with the military knows that most of the time these people know that there are no clear rules of engagement. Half the time there is not a clear objective. Almost all the time they are grossly under-equipped, grossly undermanned and in great danger. Privately they will tell you about these concerns and they are always bothered by the fact that these concerns are not taken seriously, but they are good soldiers.
Good soldiers do not complain publicly, they just do it and this should be recognized. It is about time we started to recognize these things. I must admit I am very tired of this attitude, this tendency to praise people at certain levels and then to not recognize fully the people who do the work.
We are coming out of an era finally where it seems to be a noble thing for Liberal politicians to spend other people's money so they could get credit for presumably fixing problems. I am glad we are finally starting to come out of that era and to recognize that money cannot fix everything and furthermore it is not necessarily the government's money to start with.
I see this attitude still with us in military operations and military policy. Somehow it is noble for the Prime Minister or for the government or for others to be willing to put other people's lives at risk in order to solve or deal with military and humanitarian situations around the world. Let us not forget whose lives are at risk and who are making the contributions. It is the men and women on the ground and their leaders and commanders. That is on what this bill is focused.
Let me conclude by saying that rather than hear once again in this debate all about the processes and all about the impediments to getting this approved, the protocol and the fact that Government House should be first, let us just get on with doing on the basis of recognition what we do not hesitate to do whenever the telephone rings from New York or from the United Nations. Let us recognize our peacekeepers.
It about time that the government and the ministry got off their duffs and passed this legislation.