Madam Speaker, I have a couple of comments in response to my colleague across the way.
First, there is nothing in the motion that specifically refers to September 11 although that has certainly framed a fair bit of our comment and understandably so. I believe the government is a little sensitive because in many ways it has been sleeping on many of these issues. Yes, it has embarked on some steps since September 11 but it was certainly woefully unprepared prior to September 11. Now we are in the act of trying to play catch up in many of these areas.
My colleague from Medicine Hat mentioned that there are about 27,000 failed refugee claimants in the country. We do not know where they are. That is a security issue. We know that terrorists have come through Canada before. The Ressam case is well documented.
We know that we have a long undefended border. We also know that because our neighbour to the south implemented a border patrol it catches many people crossing our borders all the time. The Americans intercept those smuggling guns, people and drugs across the undefended border. We have very limited resources in that particular area of border security. If it were not for the help provided on the south side of the border by our American friends, we would see more difficulties in that particular area.
I also want to point out that the government has cut spending to the military. The auditor general has said billions of dollars need to go back in just to get back to the point where it once was. It is the same government that cut the ports police prior to September 11. By attrition it has been responsible for many of the security issues we are now dealing with that have been highlighted by the September 11 incidents.
Would my colleague agree that prior to September 11 we were woefully unprepared and there is still lots of work to do in the area of national security for which the government is accountable?