Mr. Speaker, the figure of $500 million mentioned by the hon. member was not established by the Government of Canada.
We negotiated with the U.S. government to find out whether it was possible to reach an agreement on cleaning up certain sites.
I may remind the hon. member that the Americans deployed military units in various parts of the country over a period of nearly 40 years. At the time, conditions were vastly different from what they are today, especially with respect to the environment.
I hope the hon. member realizes what happened in other countries where the Americans had military facilities. I suggest the hon. member find out what happened when other countries, including Canada, had to deploy units for 40 or 50 years in certain countries, such as our stint in Europe with NATO.
These are situations we are dealing with now that the environment has become an important factor, but we should also remember what the situation was like when these incidents occurred.