Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to participate in the debate this afternoon. First, I would like to pay tribute to the hon. member for Saint John for her commitment to the military, to members of the Canadian Forces and to veterans.
Over in the corner I see my colleague from the defence committee, the member for Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore, who also deserves a lot of credit for some of the things that have been coming out of the defence committee. He certainly has displayed what I would describe as an independence of thought within his party as far as defence and security issues are concerned. Sometimes it is hard swimming against the current but he has done that remarkably well over the course of the last few years.
Both those members deserve credit for their concern with respect to the state of our military.
The motion before us, which stands in the name of the member for Saint John, for whom I have tremendous respect, reads:
That this House condemn the government for continuing to overstretch our military personnel and call on the government to increase spending more than is currently planned, as the Canadian Forces need more money simply to continue operating in a sustainable way.
For the benefit of those who may be watching the debate, the fact that the motion contains the word “condemn” means that it is a non-confidence motion. It is a vote with respect to confidence in the government. From that standpoint, it certainly raises the hair on the back of the neck of the people on this side of the House.
I should also say, and this is not a reflection on the member's drafting skills, but I know what was intended here. It was to take a fragment of a speech given by the Minister of National Defence and turn it into a motion, presuming of course that members of the government would be embarrassed by having to vote against the words of the Minister of National Defence.
I believe one of the reasons the defence committee has been relatively successful in terms of getting its point across with respect to the state of the military and the conditions faced by members of the Canadian Forces, is that we have taken, by and large, a fairly non-partisan attitude to the subject.
As well as the two members I mentioned before, there were other members of the defence committee from the Alliance, and even from the Bloc, who kept an open mind with respect to approaching these issues and who made a generally constructive contribution to the debate on the future of the forces.
I want to inform the House that personally I would have preferred a much more non-partisan motion that members from both sides of this House could get behind, as far as an expression of support for the military and an encouragement to the government to increase the budget for the Department of National Defence in the upcoming budget that we expect in February.
As a matter of fact, I had come up with some wording: “That the House strongly encourages the government to continue to increase the base budget of the Canadian Forces to help ensure the protection of Canadian sovereignty and to allow Canada to make greater contributions to international peace and security”. I believe that would have been a decent motion and one which I think most members of the House could have supported. I do not know whether it was lack of time or lack of consideration on this but some of the folks on the other side did not feel it was appropriate, I suppose, to support the motion. I find that regrettable.
I would encourage the members on the other side to reduce the level of partisanship that we have on this issue. If they are partisan toward us, we could be equally partisan toward them and, ultimately, that does not accomplish the goal of better public policy. I believe that very strongly.
I hope that at some point in the future the House will be able to reform itself to the point where we do not look at issues on a partisan basis, but that from time to time we look at the issue from the standpoint of the objective reality of the situation, when what is best for the men and women of the Canadian Forces rather than what is best for our particular party, or what is the best political tactic or strategy at any given moment.
The other point I want to make is that there has been additional funding for the Canadian military over the last number of years. For instance, about $3.9 billion in new funding went into the military over the course of the 1999 and 2000 budgets and more than $1.2 billion in the last budget.
We dealt with some of these issues at the defence committee in terms of the funding issue. We were concerned that some of the money that was coming in from an operational standpoint to deal with operational deficits, for instance, was not adding significantly to the base budget and there was a need for more money for the base budget. The base budget has increased somewhat but not to the extent that we on the defence committee felt was appropriate.
I draw the House's attention to the fact that if we look at the overall funding that has gone to defence from the year 2001 to what is expected in 2006-07, because there are increases built in over the next couple of years that are anticipated, the increased funding works out to about $5.1 billion. Again, some of that has been the flow through money and some has been for disaster relief for the provinces. However some of it does not add specifically to the capability of the Canadian Forces. Again, this is something that has been recognized by the Auditor General, by various groups involved in defence, such as the Conference of Defence Associations and the Council for Canadian Security in the 21st Century, by our committee and by the committee in the other place.
Another thing that is worth pointing out is that some of the money that has gone into the military over the course of the past few years has been as a direct result of some of the work that has been done by the standing committee. I would draw members' attention to the quality of life initiatives that have been announced by the government and which I must say have been very well received by the members of the Canadian Forces.
The strength of any military clearly rests with those who serve. This is why the government has taken these steps to improve the conditions of military service by enhancing the quality of life, not just of the members of the Canadian Forces but other families as well.
We have seen the pay increases that have come about over the last couple of years. We have seen housing concerns addressed. The government has also introduced special benefits and allowances, such as improved maternity and parental leave benefits. Pension Act amendments, which were of immediate assistance to about 1,200 Canadian Forces members with permanent service related disabilities, were also very important steps forward.
One of the things that struck me when I had the great opportunity and honour of visiting Canadian troops abroad was that they were able to stay in touch with their families in a more substantive way than they were in the past through access to the Internet and e-mails and long distance telephone.
Employment assistance programs have been put in place to assist spouses whose careers are often disadvantaged because of frequent moves.
As far as the daily lives of the members of the Canadian Forces, these sorts of improvements were very significant. I remember travelling with some of my colleagues from this side of the House, as well as from the other side of the House, to various bases across the country, right from Esquimalt through to Goose Bay and Halifax. We touched down in places like Moose Jaw, Edmonton, Petawawa and Valcartier. We talked to a tremendous number of people, both on and off the record, with respect to the conditions of service in the military. From that standpoint we listened, we made substantive, concrete and, I think, positive recommendations and those recommendations were listened to.
From that standpoint I would give full credit to the previous minister of national defence who did a tremendous job on the quality of life issue and who understood, better than most, that having the right people and maintaining the morale of those people is absolutely critical to any military organization.
Some military theorists say that there are three things to a military: people, ideas and equipment, in that order. I think the former minister of national defence certainly had his priorities right when he concentrated a lot of effort and a significant amount of political capital, not just himself but with the involvement of committee, in terms of the quality of life improvements.
I also want to speak to some of the modernization programs that the Canadian Forces has undertaken recently. There is a continuing commitment to the issue of maintaining multipurpose combat capable forces that are capable of performing the complex and varied tasks that have been assigned to them, whether it is ensuring the safety of Canadians, the security of the North American continent or international peace and security in general.
In recent years the government has shown its commitment to modernization, maybe not as much as we would have liked from the standpoint of the defence committee certainly, through a series of initiatives aimed at modernizing the Canadian Forces. Thanks to these initiatives, the Canadian Forces is better equipped now than it was a decade ago in terms of the level of sophistication and the level of lethality of some of the systems with which it is working.
One of the major improvements on the maritime side has been the acquisition of the Victoria class, previously known as the Upholder class, submarines.
I would like to take a moment to talk about those submarines. It is really a shame what has been said in some quarters of the media with respect to these submarines. I think they have been badly labelled as lemons. Some of the commentary that has been attached to the submarines in terms of suggesting that they are unsafe and that Canadian crews have next to mutinied and have refused to go to sea on them, has been completely inaccurate. It is a disservice to the people who are working on the submarine project and to the men and women of the Canadian Forces generally.
One of the things that concerns me is that a very positive aspect of an acquisition program, of very sophisticated equipment, has been basically maligned unfairly and has not been accurately portrayed.
I hope the defence department is listening to this because I really think it is time for us to start talking about these submarines and the capability they add to Canada's naval forces and the future of these submarines in terms of other operations.
Some people would ask why Canada has submarines. The answer, quite simply, is that approximately 600 submarines are out wandering the world's oceans. Some of them are nuclear submarines and some are diesel-electric, the more conventional type of submarines that exist. One of the reasons Canada needs submarines, in my view, is that we need an on the water, above the water and below the water capability to ensure that Canada's maritime interests are protected in the widest sense of the word.
I am not trying to underplay that there have been certain issues related to some of the technical details of these submarines, such as the problems with the ejector and diesel exhaust valves. We all know about the publicized dent in the HMCS Victoria . I went to Halifax to look at the submarines and had a look at the so-called major dent in the submarine. It is about this deep and this wide on a submarine that is, I am guessing, at least 150 feet long. Ships bump into things from time to time in docks and clearly that is what happened with the HMCS Victoria . It is not a big issue when talking about the cost of repairing it and the cost of the submarines in general.
Let us look at the cost, because it is another important issue. We paid roughly $750 million for these submarines. We essentially traded the costs for the use of Suffield, Alberta, by British forces. It was one of the most creative, forward thinking and positive acquisition programs that I have seen in relation to equipment in some time, but the fact remains that these subs are not going to go to sea unless they are right up to scratch in terms of Canadian standards. They absolutely have to be completely seaworthy and they will be by the time the project is completed.
Another point that is worth mentioning is that the cost of bringing these submarines up to Canadian standards and making them seaworthy is going to be borne largely by the government of the United Kingdom. That is an important point to make. These submarines are as complicated and as sophisticated in terms of the technology as any aircraft we will find. They have to go through the same checklist of standards across the board to ensure that they are perfectly up to Canadian standards and perfectly safe for the crews that are going to be using those submarines.
I wanted to touch on that because I think our subs have gotten a bad rap. They are going to be critical pieces of equipment, for instance in terms of surveillance of our coastal areas. I was looking through some old material on this just last week and noted a figure that really struck home with me. One of these subs, with the sophisticated listening equipment, the radar and the communications package that goes with it, will be able to control or at least know what is happening in an area of roughly 125,000 square miles. That is very significant. It is a capability we need and it is a capability that I think is going to be put to use very well with the submarine program.
Certainly I would like to touch upon a number of other issues, but one point I would like to make is this. Obviously our new defence minister's words were quoted in the context of the motion we have before us today, but I would like to pay tribute to our Minister of National Defence. Coming from an economic background with very little in the way of background as far as the military is concerned, he really has brought himself up to speed and I think he has become one of the strongest advocates we have in the government for the Canadian Forces. I think we are going to see some great things from this minister in the future. As well, and it is important to mention this, I think he is going to be successful in terms of getting more money in the budget for the Canadian Forces come February.
There are a couple of other things I should mention. Why should we put more money into the military at this time? We all know that the world is a pretty dangerous place these days. We have commitments in various places in the world, obviously in Bosnia. It is my understanding that the minister may be going to Bosnia. I am hoping to accompany him within the next little while to visit Canadian troops in the theatre of operations and to express on behalf of Canadians the level of confidence we have in the work they are doing.
There obviously is a lot more that I could say on this subject but my time is running short. Let me leave members with one simple thought. As a Parliament, I think we have to come together in a non-partisan way in terms of dealing with the issue of the Canadian Forces and the things that we expect of them. The Canadian Forces, the Department of National Defence, is not a department like any other department of government. It has very special responsibilities that go right to the heart of our sovereignty, right to the heart of protecting everything we value as Canadians, and also right to the heart of projecting those values internationally in terms of our contributions to international peace and security. Let me end my comments there. I would be happy to respond to any questions members may have.