Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Winnipeg North Centre because has hit the nail right on the head.
I am a big fan of George Orwell. I really enjoy reading his books. Even today they have a sense of reality about what takes place in our society. I was thinking that had George Orwell been in this chamber today and heard the Minister of National Defence say that on the one hand we are going to enter into discussions with the U.S. to get into star wars but we are doing this under the rationale that we are still opposed to the weaponization of space, he would have been nodding his head and saying “See, I told you so. That is a really good example of doublespeak”. The comments from my hon. colleague really outline this.
A fundamental contradiction is being put forward on the rationale of somehow protecting Canada's sovereignty. I really feel that this is just a horrible joke because the threat is not from ballistic missiles. To develop a trillion dollar system that allegedly is going to protect us from this, is a complete illusion.
The member has pointed out that it has more to do with economic issues in the U.S. and Canada's apparent desire to appear to be willing. Maybe because of what took place in Iraq there is now a rush to appease the American government and Mr. Bush and say that we have to kind of go along with this.
If that does happen, we are the ones who will receive the fallout. If things are shot down, it will be on Canadian soil that this plays out. We have to be hugely concerned about Norad's involvement in this. That is the best reason to turn down this motion today and say that in no way should Norad be engaging in an exercise around star wars and the missile defence system. That is not what its purpose is. This is just about a strategy to somehow kickstart Norad. It is a very dangerous policy and we should have no part of it.