Madam Speaker, today is not just about the Victoria Cross and Jess Larochelle, but about veterans of the war in Afghanistan. I think they often do not feel recognized in the same way that maybe their World War I, World War II and even Korean War colleagues are, whether that be by the Legion, the general public, the government or the people of Canada. I think we saw that reflected a little recently in the ceremony, where many of them felt like they were an afterthought with respect to the monument that was supposed to be in their honour.
Then we heard the member's speech today, which saddened me, because I know there are many members over there who care about this. I feel like this member stood up and gave a political speech. He talked about everything but what it is supposed to be about.
What I would ask the member is this: Will he apologize, first of all, for making this political today rather than keeping it about what it should be about? Will he apologize for the debacle that was the Afghanistan war monument groundbreaking and how veterans felt left out? Will he acknowledge that the Afghanistan veterans fought in a war?