Mr. Speaker, since the Liberal government took office in 1993 there have been 770 emergency landings by Sea King and Labrador helicopters, including two deaths in 1994.
It costs $66 million a year and takes up to 30 hours of maintenance for each hour of flying to keep these aging helicopters in the air.
Last month six Labrador choppers were grounded for two weeks and we learned that the Sea Kings have cracks in their airframes.
This weekend the navy's entire fleet of Sea Kings was grounded because of a problem with the hinge assembly on the main rotor head. The Minister of National Defence described the situation as being not very much of a problem at all.
In case the minister has not noticed, the main rotor is the device that keeps the helicopters in the air. It is not good enough to patch and bandage these old machines at great expense to the taxpayers. It is time the government showed some leadership by announcing a replacement helicopter contract.