Mr. Chairman, $700 million more five years from now does not sound like very much of a commitment.
Officially the defence budget is around $12 billion. Can the minister tell us what portion of the budget is tied to supporting things which are not conventional military spending? Quite a large part of the department funding does not include military spending. The Conference of Defence Associations and others have said that is maybe $2 billion to $3 billion out of that $12 billion budget, probably 30%.
I would like the minister to verify whether he sees that as correct or not, that $2 billion to $3 billion, or roughly 30% of the budget which is non-military.