Mr. Speaker, my colleague can rest assured that the planes she mentioned, and perhaps others, have never before been subjected to such rigorous evaluation.
The evaluation is being carried out under the authority of a new secretariat that was given its mandate by the government itself and that reports to the House. This is unprecedented for the procurement of fighter jets for Canada.
Yes, we must make that distinction. There are two programs to develop a new aircraft with several partners.
Several hundreds of millions of dollars has already been spent, but not one cent has been spent to date to replace our CF-18s, no contract has been signed, and no decision about or analysis of the options has been made.
We are taking the time necessary for due diligence, to ensure oversight and transparency and that we get the right aircraft and value for taxpayers' money. The current Auditor General has already said that our government is taking steps in the right direction and there have been other very positive comments on the success of these seven points so far. We will wait for the options analysis, hopefully later this year, and for the completion of the seven points.