Mr. Chair, I would like to further the conversation that he and I had in committee on post-traumatic stress disorder. When I visited the Edmonton base a number of years ago, there were tremendous concerns that each soldier was not fully screened for post-traumatic stress on return from theatre.
I am heartened to hear from the minister that he is not wanting to redeploy soldiers who have been there. I would like to know whether he had that point of view when he or his government agreed to extend the mission to 2009.
Can he tell the House that every soldier is screened for post-traumatic stress, the finest kind of screening, upon return to Canada and that every soldier who is redeployed to Afghanistan is screened before leaving?
Can he tell me the divorce rate of soldiers compared to the national average, the suicide rate compared to the national average, the domestic violence rate compared to the national average? Then could he explain why it is that our military families are not treated as families in order to find the details of those troubles early? Why are military families waiting two years in town and not being treated on bases with their spouses?