Mr. Speaker, I am glad you mentioned that. I am pleased, in fact, to have the member mention my presence. I think people who read Hansard will see who was here and who was not here for the 30 hours of debate. I will just leave that to the folks who want to read Hansard.
The member is right. We try not to misrepresent things. When we are in committee, we try to work together, and by and large we do a pretty good job. I am disappointed that he has not carried that over into the House, because in fact he misrepresented many things. I will point out a number of them.
The Manley report said that we needed a minimum of 1,000 soldiers in the south of Afghanistan, specifically in Kandahar, to allow the Canadian Forces to focus more effort on training, reconstruction and development. That is what Manley asked for. That is what is in fact happening.
He talked about ministerial visits to committees. Our ministers have visited committees dozens of times. There is no occasion when this current minister has been asked to come that he has not come. It is simply misleading to suggest that he is somehow holding out. There have been I think 17 technical briefings on the mission in Afghanistan, all but one by this government.
The member talked about parliamentary travel. The defence committee travelled to Afghanistan in January 2007. We have had travel approved. There is no issue of delay in travel at all. It is happening according to the process that normally takes place in this House. To represent otherwise is simply misleading.
He talked about debate. We are the only government that has debated the mission in Afghanistan in this House--twice. It is very misleading to suggest that we have not had fulsome debate in this House. I was disappointed to see the member misrepresent that.
He talked about contracts, saying that we should have contracts to Canadian companies. Canadian companies can bid on any contracts they want. Nothing is stopping them.
We do not go into a mission like Afghanistan to benefit Canadian companies or to benefit anybody financially. We go into a mission like Afghanistan to do the right thing.
Responsibility to protect cannot be just words. It has to be actions. We are taking those actions. We are doing it for the right reason. We would all work better if we did not misrepresent, on either side, what is going on. I would ask the member to stop that.