Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity this evening, despite my mild laryngitis, to debate the motion that is now before us.
I am pleased to follow my colleague who very ably represents Ottawa Centre. I am also pleased to say he has succeeded me as the foreign affairs critic for the New Democratic Party and doing an excellent job.
When I entered the chamber this evening, I was listening attentively and respectfully to the Minister of Veterans Affairs who was commenting, and I thought quite appropriately, that we all share a duty.
Those of us in this House who are privileged to serve the people of our communities, and Canadians generally, have an obligation to honour our military men and women, both in times of peace and in times of war. I was nodding in assent and was actually going to compliment him on being inclusive in representing all of us in those comments.
Then he turned and engaged in the most viscous, most vile, and most virulent attack on the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore who is not here in the House in any way, shape, or form to defend himself and who, I have to say, has probably done more for veterans and for the military in my 10 years in Ottawa than any other member in this chamber.
Let Canadians be the judge, but I thought it was unfortunate and ironic. For a few brief moments the Minister of Veterans Affairs, I thought, was going to rise to the occasion, however, he actually descended into the depths and conducted a viscous attack on a man who has championed the veterans independence program and the widows that have been left behind. He has championed the children who are not getting the kind of treatment needed to deal with their wounds resulting from the death or injury of absent family members and returned family members.
He is also the man who has championed the victims of agent orange. I could go on and on, but I think we will just let those Canadians who know better come to their own conclusions based on the evidence and not based on this astounding rant that we just heard and is now on the public record.
I listened earlier this afternoon when the Minister of Veterans Affairs actually made some very sweeping statements that were dead wrong and utterly disrespectful. How those members elevate the debate, how they act to contribute to a respectful debate, I do not know, but I have to say he hit a raw never. He made a sweeping reference that New Democrats do not care about our troops. They never cared about the military. I do not know if he said never will, but I am sure that was in his mind too.
What it caused me to do was go back to my office briefly this afternoon and pull off my shelf something that I had been thinking about reviewing for some time and that is the publication Marching Home to What?. It is a document produced by the predecessor of the New Democratic Party, the CCF, outlining the post-war program for Canada's fighting men and women.
The reason it hit a raw nerve is not just because I am unduly partisan, but my father was one of the two authors of that report. He was working on Parliament Hill as a researcher with the CCF caucus when Canada entered the war and he went into the air force. He never stopped working on the issue of support for our military through the war, and after the war went right back to working on the post-war program for the military.
It seems to me it does not serve our troops very well and it does not do a thing to honour this place to engage in those kinds of mindless rants.
Having said that, it threw me right back to one of the worst moments, really the worst few hours, I have ever spent in the 10 years that I have been privileged to be a member of Parliament and that was two days after I returned from a trip to Afghanistan in May 2006, which I was very privileged to have taken and was grateful for the opportunity.
To my utter dismay, the Minister of National Defence, who we accompanied to Afghanistan, did not say a word about the fact that the government would be bringing in a last minute motion to extend the then mission, which was already raising a lot of concerns, for another two years. This really blindsided and short-circuited any meaningful debate.
What we saw was the beginning of what has never stopped with the government and that is name calling and all kinds of insults being hurled about cut and run and other allegations, instead of a respectful debate that would honour our military, both departed, currently serving and our vets who watch all of this with great care and concern.
It does not surprise me a great deal that the Conservatives and Liberals have struck a bipartisan understanding around the motion, which they are entitled to do. We must be respectful in this House if that is the way they see it. However, what is regretful is that there is not a lot of evidence that in the striking of this bipartisan deal on which we will be voting, the views of Canadians, to a large extent, seem not to have been taken into account.
At the end of the day, a great deal of evidence shows that Canadians have a growing concern about the fact that the counter-insurgency mission in Kandahar is making a lot of serious problems even worse. We heard the statistics earlier. My leader spoke very capably on this earlier this afternoon, as did the NDP defence critic, and outlined the evidence, the facts and the figures on our contribution. It is not because our military men and women are failing us, not at all. I agree with those who have said in debate all day long that we are privileged to have the best military men and women in the world serving us with honour, distinction and great competence. However, they have been assigned to a mission that is flawed and is failing.
I cannot for the life of me understand how it is the Conservatives and Liberals alike constantly rant and rail about the countries that will not deliver more troops through NATO to take up the Kandahar counter-insurgency mission when they know perfectly well why there are not more countries coming forth to assign their military men and women to the Kandahar mission. It is not because they are wimps or cowards. It is because they believe the mission is flawed. Many of those countries are serving in other parts of Afghanistan and some very positive results are happening as a result of that.
I want to say respectfully that I had an opportunity this afternoon for a detailed briefing, which I very much appreciated, with CIDA officials. I have not a doubt that much of the positive results they were presenting and sharing in other parts of Afghanistan are very well-documented and substantiated. It is happening because it is based on a fundamentally different approach.
My colleague who just spoke expressed the importance of that comprehensive peace building process that is needed. It has not happened and it needs to be regional in nature. I cannot believe the veterans affairs minister started in on my leader calling him “Taliban Jack” this afternoon. How pathetic is that when we know that when President Karzai was here in this chamber talking with members, after his presentation he said that we needed that kind of comprehensive peace building process to get under way. That was almost two years ago.
With respect to development, the amendment we have put forward recognizes that the way to build a path to peace in Afghanistan is through genuine development and through understanding that it is the people of Afghanistan whose interests we need to be concerned about, not the voters of Canada when it comes to saying that we need more flags being waved over projects sponsored by Canada. Will that make the Afghan people feel better? No. Is it to win votes? It is beneath the dignity of Parliament to be caught up in those kinds of arguments.
Even though there does not seem to be any indication that other colleagues are prepared to support our amendments, I am asking Canadians to carefully consider the amendments and understand that they are much more promising in terms of paving a path to peace for the future of the people of Afghanistan, and that is why we are supposed to be there.