Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois, it is my pleasure to speak today and lead off the debate during this session. We have read the motion put forward by my colleague from Ontario and, of course, one could hardly oppose it. When soldiers are sent into theatres of operation, to me it seems perfectly natural that they would be suitably equipped and receive the necessary support. However, as far as the necessary support is concerned, I would like to say loud and clear right off the bat that the Bloc Québécois does not appreciate being attacked for speaking out against a mission, the government, the Minister of National Defence or any other minister.
In my opinion, a clarification needs to be made. A parliamentary debate needs to be held in this House. Just because we criticize the minister or the government about the mandate of the mission does not automatically mean we are against the troops. That is absolutely not true. It is the George W. Bush style approach that the Bloc Québécois takes issue with.
It is important for hon. members and Parliament's political parties to give their opinion. What is more, we do not appreciate being told that if we speak out against a government policy, the mandate of the mission or the Minister of National Defence, we are against the troops in Afghanistan. That is not so. Again, we were against extending the mission, but Parliament has spoken. We are not like the Conservative government, which does not listen to Parliament. We listen to Parliament.
It goes without saying that once the decision has been made and soldiers are sent there, it is important to give them the necessary equipment. I also want to mention that as far as the theatres of operation are concerned, things have changed dramatically in the past few years and many Quebeckers and Canadians still think that the current mission in Afghanistan is a peacekeeping mission. That is not the case at all. There are different missions now. I want to remind hon. members that a peacekeeping mission is probably the easiest mission, although there is a risk component.
By definition, a peacekeeping mission is a rather simple mission. After both sides have signed a ceasefire agreement, the international community, Canada or other countries provide a buffer between the two sides to ensure the observance of the ceasefire. That is not at all what is going on in Afghanistan, where the mission is more of a pacification effort. Canada is there to support Afghanistan and the Afghan government, and it wants to try and restore peace by fighting the Taliban. I should also mention that the Bloc Québécois has been stressing for the past several months the need for the mission to be not only a combat mission but also one of reconstruction and development as well as one to restore the authority of the national government. Our comments on the matter have been very balanced, and we have raised these points repeatedly. I thought it was important to remind the House of that.
That having been said, our colleague's motion also raises questions. For example, is Canada's current foreign policy clear? It has not been updated in quite a while. As far as I know, the new Conservative government has not developed any new foreign policy. The existing policy is the one put in place by the former Liberal government, and the same is true for the defence policy. This means that we are talking about policy dating back to 2005.
One of the problems that arise where equipment is concerned is that, once a foreign or defence policy has been decided on, a military capabilities plan should normally follow. Whenever an approach to theatre operations or a new vision of international relations is developed, equipment has to be provided accordingly. Unfortunately, that part has not been dealt with yet. Neither the Liberal government nor the Conservative government before us today has delivered a military capabilities plan.
What does it entail? It entails a series of purchases for which Canadian and Quebec taxpayers will have to pay, without even knowing if the equipment in question meets the defence and foreign policy requirements because the capabilities plan should normally have preceded these purchases.
This creates all kinds of problems, as we can see. Would the contract with Boeing for strategic aircraft, C-17s and Chinook helicopters, have been included in a military capabilities plan? Why are these purchases going ahead without a plan?
The C-17 strategic aircraft brings up a fundamental question: if all the equipment and all the soldiers are already in Afghanistan, what good will four big strategic airlift aircraft be? This is one of the questions that could have been asked if a capabilities plan had been submitted to Parliament and if it had discussed whether the aircraft were really needed. We could have also looked at whether military planners, for example, could push for strategic sealift instead of strategic airlift, which probably costs four or five times as much. These are the kinds of things that should have been discussed.
We more or less agree on the purchase of the Chinook helicopters. Currently, troops and materials in Afghanistan are transported by land. We know the problems that can arise, given improvised explosives, mines, etc. Soldiers are losing their lives. With a heavy lift helicopter, we could probably avoid these dangers.
We agree with some things, but not with others. What we find most troubling is that there was never an opportunity to discuss this. We have to proceed bit by bit, but when we do, the Conservative government tries to tell us that we are not supporting the troops, that we are bad for their morale. Maybe they are the ones whose policies are causing these events to happen.
There is also the issue of prisoners. They say that we are undermining morale. Why has the minister not listened to us for months? For the past year, we have been hounding the minister about the importance of copying the Dutch agreement almost entirely. According to that agreement, Dutch embassy staff and soldiers can visit detainees anytime. The minister totally ignored us. Not only did he ignore us, he misled us by saying that the Red Cross was conducting inspections and that it would report any unusual occurrences that did not comply with the Geneva convention. As it turns out, that is not really how it happens.
For a year, we did not have a real policy concerning detainees, and now the minister has a problem. Now that the Bloc is criticizing the fact that the minister misled it and all of the other parties in the House, the government is saying that we want to destroy troop morale. That is George W. Bush-style logic, and we will not buy it.
Nevertheless, the minister and the Prime Minister have made $20 billion in announcements with no defence capabilities plan, as I said earlier.
We should also talk about tactical aircraft. We agree with them a little more on this issue, but we find that the calls for tender were subject to conditions and that the government wanted to do some companies a favour. When you start playing that game, when a company knows that it is the one you want, you do not get a good deal.
I do not wish to repeat my Camaro story again, as I believe I have told it a number of times here in the House. I wanted to buy myself a nice car when I was very young. When I went to the car sales lot, I told the salesman I wanted to buy that car and only that particular car. Imagine trying to ask for a good deal after that. My father told me that that was not how it worked.
Yet, even though we are talking about $20 billion worth of procurement, that is how the government is going about it. It develops an advance contract, which means that it tells a company in advance that it wants to purchase that aircraft from that company, and only from that company. How could it possibly negotiate after the fact?
The same thing is happening in the area of strategic lift. We now see that we are purchasing aircraft and paying a higher price than our allies paid a few years ago. The higher price represents more than just indexation. We are talking about some $20 million more for each aircraft. The government seems happy to let the taxpayers pick up the tab.
I believe that we, as members of Parliament, are here to defend the interests of taxpayers. If we fail to do so, we are showing disrespect for our constituents and neglecting our responsibilities to Parliament and to Canadian taxpayers.
Of course, we cannot oppose the motion here before us, but we can speak out against some things, including much of the purchasing.
I would have liked to have a little more time to explain the submarine disaster to the House. Nonetheless, everyone here understands that, when there is no plan in place, that is what happens. Sometimes we purchase things, only to later regret it.