Mr. Speaker, across the years, when the call went out, Canadians answered, and were willing to lay their lives on the line for what we know to be right and just.
Beginning in the fall of 2001 and until the final Canadian soldiers returned from Afghanistan in March of this year, some 40,000 men and women went halfway around the world, willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, and 158 did.
We celebrate those who returned. We mourn for those who did not, and their families.
Tomorrow, across the country, we will mark this solemn occasion and commemorate these men and women with the National Day of Honour, a fitting tribute to pause and rightly recognize each and every person who showed such courage and endured such terrible trials in service of their country.
I leave it to those more adept than I to find the proper words to lend poetry to the potent mix of admiration, gratitude, sorrow, and pride that we feel this day, and every day, for our Canadian Forces and veterans. I will simply offer my thanks and lest we forget.