Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague. Certainly I think he was speaking from the heart, especially at the end of his remarks when he was talking about the soldiers and the families of the fallen.
I could not agree more with him that this is a reckless and irresponsible motion. It puts our soldiers who are still in theatre at a greater risk. It is of comfort only to our enemies, not our armed forces personnel.
I would also draw for the member a similar perspective on the motion on which we just voted and the hon. member supported. February 2009 is still almost two years away. There is a lot of work to be done. As he just admitted by his own remarks when he talked about a tragically injured soldier who had returned home, he still supports the mission. He still supports the objectives and the goals and the things we hope we can accomplish in concert with the Afghan people.
I would point this out to the hon. member. We are debating a motion today that I agree is completely irresponsible. In fact, I would use the term ludicrous. It is irresponsible to send a signal that we want to pull out immediately. It is also irresponsible to send a signal to the Taliban and to our enemies, the terrorists, who are fighting our brave young men and women in Afghanistan, that if they can just hold on and inflict as much damage as possible to February 2009, then no matter what happens in February 2009 we will pull out, no matter what stage the conflict is at. That, too, is completely irresponsible.