Mr. Chair, I think it was a bit of an insult to the Secretary General of the United Nations to say that he was not talking about Canada today, that he was factually incorrect to say that we do not have the defence to do anything.
We had General Leslie in the gallery the other day who received a huge applause. I would not say that was for doing nothing. That was for the tremendous contribution Canada is making in Afghanistan. I was there. We have roughly 2,000 troops and many other nations have 10, 20 or 30 troops in that particular community. We are providing an incredible role in peacekeeping. The general said that we save thousands and thousands of lives. I would not consider saving thousands of lives as doing nothing.
I want to ask the member about his policy. We have fairly close to a balanced budget. There is not a lot of spare cash. We still have a lot of child poverty. We have regions that are poorer than other regions and they need cash. We are putting in new programs for disabled people. Our aboriginal peoples have lower living standards and they have more deaths during childbirth.
What programs would the member take the money from to provide these largely increased levels of defence? He has not explained to the foreign affairs minister what he would use those increased levels of defence for.