Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address a specific issue in the prebudget debate, namely building a role of pride and influence for Canada in the world.
Approximately half a century ago, Lester B. Pearson had a vision that young Canadian men and women would not travel to trouble spots around the world as soldiers but as peacekeepers. He envisioned that our young men and women would not bring war but peace to other parts of the world. For this, our former prime minister won the Nobel Peace Prize and Canada earned a place of great respect internationally among first and third world countries.
In the 21st century we are seeing the evolution of this vision. Our government has talked of a new peace and nation building initiative which has four component parts.
The first will continue building on our great peacekeeping tradition. We have made a commitment to add 5,000 soldiers to our forces and 3,000 reservists. To show our appreciation of the work that they do, we have committed and we have said that they will not pay income taxes when they do their work in trouble spots. We have also made a commitment to purchase state of the art equipment, armoured vehicles, search and rescue aircraft and helicopters and supply ships.
However, our vision has evolved beyond just peacekeeping. Canada will also help in building democracy and civil society in countries undergoing difficult political and economic transitions. To this end, we announced the formation of a Canada Corps. In December we saw the very successful completion of the first Canada Corps project.
As the House will recall, in the fall in Ukraine an orange revolution was taking place. Canada demonstrated its special relationship with Ukraine in the House. Our Deputy Prime Minister spoke clearly that Canada would not accept the massive fraud of an election that took place on November 21. That was followed by non-partisan votes in the House where a very clearly worded motion was passed unanimously saying that Canada did not accept these results and that there would be consequences if the will of the people was not respected.
Often motions are passed in the House and then they gather dust. In this case we have demonstrated that we will play and have a role of pride and influence. Soon after the supreme court of Ukraine annulled the second round vote, we announced the first Canada Corps project, an unprecedented 500 election observers to travel to Ukraine to ensure that the will of the people would be respected.
Today there are 500 goodwill ambassadors throughout the country that will talk in their constituencies and in their various communities about this new role that Canada has taken on in the world.
We have seen in the last week the election in Iraq which has taken place. Once again we played a very important role. We did not send soldiers, we sent electoral experts to ensure that in these very difficult and trying times in Iraq democracy might have a chance. They were quite successful in their results.
I have talked about our role as a peacekeeping nation and how it has evolved into civil society building and democratic initiatives. However, there is a war that we have declared. It is a war against disease in the third world.
Many third world countries face numerous challenges, and one of the worst is curable diseases which prevent them from moving forward.
We have taken direct aim and declared war on disease in the third world. We have dedicated $100 million so that three million people suffering from HIV-AIDS will receive drug treatment. We have dedicated $70 million to the global fund to fight HIV-AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Finally, our peace and nation building initiative has a fourth component. It involves reducing and forgiving debts to the third world.
The present governments and future generations of many third world nations have been anchored to the past by huge debt loads. We will make efforts among our allies, among the circle of democratic nations, the G-20, so that other developed countries share in our vision. However, if necessary, we will not be timid and we will take the lead. We have demonstrated this with our Canada corps project. We have demonstrated this with the $100 million that we have dedicated to provide three million people with drugs to relieve their suffering from HIV-AIDS.
The 21st century beckons, and Canada will respond by building a role of pride and influence in the world. We have taken initial steps, and the upcoming budget will confirm this vision.