Mr. Speaker, with a finger in the wind and his head in the sand, the member for Markham—Unionville announced that his Liberals want to one-up the NDP call to withdraw our troops from Afghanistan by pulling out reconstruction teams too. In a rush to see who cuts and runs faster, he is hoping Canadians forget he was in cabinet sending our troops to Kandahar and as defence minister oversaw our mission.
Worse, the former prime minister was in cabinet when his Liberals sent our troops to Afghanistan. As prime minister he sent them to Kandahar, but recently Mr. Dithers went to New York to hobnob, too busy to show up for a vote on extending the mission and too busy to show up for President Karzai's speech, but not too busy to criticize from the shadows the mission he started.
A Liberal pullout is not a big surprise. After all, they pulled out half their caucus before President Karzai's speech last week. The Liberals cut on Afghanistan before its president could ask for more of our support.
Liberals can run, but this government will stay firm in our commitment to the people of Afghanistan.