Madam Speaker, of course all of us in the House agree on the great job our men and women in the armed forces do and, in a lot of cases, do in spite of the rambling, old equipment with which they are forced to work.
There is an old axiom in real estate. There are only three rules in real estate: location, location, location. There is really only the same type of axiom in purchasing and procurement: best value, best value, best value.
We saw the helicopter issue debundled and chased around the block for 10 years under the Liberal government. We have now seen it rebundled. The government says that it has four inquiries of potential bidders, which is fantastic, but the big point it is making here is life cycle cost. I guess it just goes beyond all reason that we did buy the best ones in 1963 because they had to do double duty. They have extended their life cycle by double. Instead of a 20 year life cycle, they have been extended to 40 years. Therefore if we had bought the cheapest ones in 1963 they would not have lasted and performed as they have.
I would ask the government to make sure it gets past this lowest price compliance attitude that it has and think about best value for that life cycle that it will probably extend again.