Mr. Speaker, putting aside the implication that I am somehow lying, on missions like Afghanistan, clearly we are not going to use F-35s in Afghanistan. I think even my hon. colleague can figure that one out.
With respect to the cost of the airplane, we are going to pay between $70 million and $75 million per aircraft. That is in there. That is the same price that every member of the MOU is going to pay, whether it is Australia, the United States, the U.K. or whoever.
People outside of the MOU will have to pay an additional fee. It is called the foreign military sales fee, and that amounts to between 8% and 10%. If we were to buy the aircraft outside of the MOU, that would amount to an extra $850 million of taxpayers' money that we would not have to pay by being inside the MOU.
There are many other advantages of being inside the MOU, and I listed many of them; they are numerous. That is why we have great strength within the MOU with the partnership that we have and the oversight that we have from the United States Congress. We welcome that kind of oversight because it is to the benefit of everybody within the program.
I will remind my hon. colleague that the United States government is underwriting any increase in development costs for the aircraft.
Our price is a good price, and it is cheaper than the alternative of buying the other airplanes that have been mentioned outside of the MOU.