Mr. Speaker, we welcome this announcement of additional funding for development assistance to Afghanistan.
As the leader of the New Democratic Party has stated before in the House, our party and our caucus stands unequivocally behind development assistance to the people of Afghanistan.
We are encouraged by this small commitment that the Prime Minister has made today and we ask the Prime Minister to assure Canadians that Canada will continue to work closely with the Asian Development Bank, and ensure that Canada will seriously consider contributing to the additional rural development needs identified by the bank.
However, this contribution of development assistance must be compared to the price of the military commitment we have made in Afghanistan. Along with the billions of dollars spent on the counter-insurgency campaign against Taliban remnants, Canada has sadly lost the lives of courageous young men and women. We must always keep the human cost front and centre in all our discussions about our role in Afghanistan.
After a hasty debate and vote, Conservatives and many Liberals approved the new two year mission in Afghanistan, a counter-insurgency mission, with little idea of the cost of this mission or its effectiveness.
Unfortunately, in the House and at the defence committee, we have not had open or genuine debate on all of the aspects of our mission in Afghanistan. The debate has been constrained and in the defence committee, the debate was curtailed. We would like to see genuine debate from the government and engagement with all Canadians about our role in Afghanistan.
We, along with most Canadians, stand in favour of assistance to the security, peace and development of Afghanistan. The development assistance announced today is a small step on the path to achieving those goals.