Mr. Speaker, I will attempt to address some of those concerns. I said in my remarks that questions are important. Valid questions are even more important and we are waiting to hear some of those. However, to simply dismiss the agreement by projecting that there is stealth going on is not valid. It is always this creation of the straw man or the straw person that one can deflect any intent to just stand up and make a decision. Bring on the legitimate questions, but do not dismiss it by saying there is some stealth going on when there is no evidence of that.
The member quite rightly talked about the binational planning group. If she is saying there is some kind of stealth going on, she is questioning the Canadians who form half of that binational planning group and assuming it is a group of Canadians that is secretly planning something other than what we are stating here. That stretches the imagination a little. Bring us that evidence because we would certainly want to know if that type of thing was going on.
She talked about the sharing of intelligence. Is she unaware of the amount of intelligence sharing that goes on now to protect our borders alone? We had an excellent pilot project called Shiprider on the Great Lakes just recently where our intelligence and enforcement officers worked together in teams to ensure that the border would be protected. They tried out that particular type of approach, each maintaining their own areas of sovereignty. American officers could not conduct their activities in Canada and we could not unilaterally go into the United States and conduct ours.
Through the sharing of joint intelligence great synergies can develop. No man is an island, no woman is an island, and no nation is an island any longer. We have to share our intelligence capabilities with one another to enhance our degree of protection. I say to go ahead and raise these questions.
The member also mentioned renewing the contract. Of course that is what we are doing. It has been renewed a number of times since 1958. We are saying we will not commit ourselves to something without any kind of renewal and that is why we want to be in a position where every four years we will review this agreement. If at any time Canadians send us the signal that they want us to move out of this, we can do so with a one year notice.
She can talk about consulting with Canadians, as she has, but I have not heard a resounding voice from the majority of Canadians saying, “Get us out of this deal, we do not want to enhance our own protection this way”. I have just not heard that.