Mr. Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to participate in this debate. I will be splitting my time with the member for Laurentides—Labelle.
I am pleased to rise and participate. I want to thank the member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie for her motion. In another life, she and I were co-conspirators on a number of issues, most particularly with respect to corporate social responsibility. However, I regret that I will not be able to support the motion for a very simple reason. It appears that we are going to amend the law first and then find out about the evidence second. We should at least go through the business of finding out the evidence first, then if the law needs to be amended, we should amend it after we have heard the evidence.
It does give me an opportunity to talk about the Canadian defence industry. The Government of Canada is committed to working with the industry to strengthen it, both for economic and military purposes. A stronger defence industry builds a stronger economy. A stronger defence industry builds a stronger military, and a stronger military builds a stronger Canada.
Our government has demonstrated its commitment to providing the Canadian Armed Forces with the equipment they need to take on the important tasks we assign to them. This is a particular aspect of the minister's mandate letter, which states that the minister needs to “Ensure that the Canadian Armed Forces have the equipment they need”.
If there is one thing we can all agree on today it is the fact that we ask a lot of our service men and women. We expect them to defend Canada and North America and to take on international peace and stability tasks abroad, often with partners and allies within the context of international coalitions, such as the one operating in Iraq today. These are highly dangerous missions. In fact, at this very moment, there are literally thousands of Canadian Armed Forces members deployed abroad.
In order to do this they must be well equipped. If they are going to be well equipped, it would be preferable that it be with Canadian equipment. That is why military procurement in Canada aims to achieve three broad objectives: timely delivery, fair and transparent procurement processes, and economic benefits to Canada.
In order to achieve those three goals, we have to have a defence industry if there are to be economic benefits. In the business of procurement, one of the things is obviously the economic benefits. If we had no defence industry, we would be very hard pressed to get economic benefits out of any procurement.
The Department of National Defence defines the requirements. Public Services and Procurement Canada sets the procurement strategy; and Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada administers the industrial and technological benefits policy. Each year, defence procurement represents a significant area of federal expenditure. For example, Mr. Speaker, in your riding of Halifax West, there were direct expenditures of $116 million in your riding alone. If one just applies a multiplier of one, that means something north of a quarter of a billion dollars gets spent by the defence department each and every year in your riding. Almost 2,000 employees are postal coded in your riding alone, Mr. Speaker. I knew that would get your attention.
Defence procurement also represents a significant portion of public services. In this particular instance, at $6.2 billion, it constitutes 42% of the government's procurement on average over the last 10 years. Contracting by the Department of National Defence under authorities delegated by Public Services and Procurement Canada to DND accounted for an additional $700 million.
The vast majority of DND projects are completed successfully without any issues. Still, over the last year, we have looked at defence procurement to identify where improvements could be made. We are now taking actions to complete those changes.
We are improving our procurement capability by hiring and enhancing our professional capabilities. We are drawing lesson from our allies, particularly Australia and the United States where the governments have been working closely with industry to make in-service support more efficient, and we are streamlining internal approval processes to cut approval times in half.
I am confident that these measures will help improve our procurement and make it easier for our men and women in uniform to get the equipment they need in a timely manner. All of this is to say that the success of Canada's defence industry is critical to the success of our military. Their products and innovation and creativity lead ultimately to highly effective tools and greater protection of Canadians in uniform. This is a critical relationship and one that we want to continue to build on.
However, beyond the benefits to our military, there is another important reason to keep our defence industry strong, that being the Canadians they employ. For instance, the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries says that the sector employs 63,000 Canadians and generates $10 billion in annual revenue, roughly 60% coming from exports. For instance, the direct spending in the riding of London North Centre, which abuts London—Fanshawe, is $375 million. I know that might cause some jealousy, but nevertheless, even again using a multiplier of just one, that is three quarters of a billion dollars being spent by defence in one riding and one riding alone.
Defence industry jobs are skilled jobs and pay quite a bit more on average than most industrial jobs do, and the products they produce are in high demand. As technology advances, as the battlefield becomes more complex and more dependent on information technology, the equipment needed by our men and women in uniform grows ever more sophisticated. The research and development these companies undertake will drive even more innovation and more Canadian expertise.
This is how Christyn Cianfarani, President of the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries, put it in an opinion piece just this week:
...defence procurement and defence R&D can be powerful instruments in the innovation policy arsenal, and can help foster new, as well as strengthen existing clusters. This can lead to commercial applications that have enormous long-term benefits for a country’s productivity and competitiveness.
Mr. Speaker, I know you have copious free time for reading and may I suggest that you read the book, Start-up Nation, which shows how the Government of Israel uses its defence capabilities to innovate. Those innovations in turn lead to significant commercial applications, which lead to wealth generation in that nation.
Canadian defence companies are technology firms. They are innovators in areas such as radar satellites, including RADARSAT-2 and the forthcoming RADARSAT Constellation mission. Canadian companies are truly world class and their work is highly dependent on our own military. It is harder and more complex for Canadian firms to market their products abroad.
It just does not make sense. This is not a motion that we can support.
The government is committed to working with the defence industry. The government is committed to supporting this important sector, as it seeks markets to support high-paying, high-skilled jobs.
At the present time, we are leading a multinational NATO task force in Latvia; potentially contributing to peace support operations in Africa; fighting the fight in Iraq against Daesh; and doing daily operations both here and in North America. We support the great work they do. A stronger industry builds a stronger military, and a stronger economy builds a stronger Canada. I think that is something we can all agree on.
