Karen Redman

[Canada Elections Act, April 24th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, Liberals will be voting no.

[Afghanistan, April 24th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, the minister has repeatedly said that the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, which has publicly admitted to only having seven staff members and no capacity to monitor prisoner abuse in Afghanistan, is looking after things.

Once again, the defence minister is either greatly misinformed or is simply misleading this House. The minister was not aware of the role of the Red Cross. He was not aware of the inability of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission to do its job. Now he says that he is unable to answer questions about the abuse of detainees.

Does the Minister of National Defence still have the confidence of the Prime Minister?

[Afghanistan, April 24th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, for nearly a year, the Minister of National Defence has misled this House about the role of the Red Cross, insisting that it was responsible for supervising the treatment of detainees transferred to the Afghan authorities.

When the international Red Cross publicly corrected the minister, he was forced to apologize to this House.

Could the minister tell Canadians what immediate steps he is taking to verify that detainees captured by Canadian Forces in Afghanistan and transferred to Afghan authorities are being properly treated?

[Employment Insurance Act, April 19th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

I recognize the fact that everybody is in the spirit of cooperation. We agreed to see the clock as 5:30 p.m. I am wondering with the indulgence of the House and the Chair if we could suspend the sitting for perhaps 10 minutes because we do have members who are en route to the House for the late show. They were doing television shows and other things and were unable to come to the House.

I would seek unanimous consent to suspend for 10 minutes.

[Business of Supply, April 19th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I find it very interesting that the leader of the NDP would propose this without even walking around or indeed, giving us a heads up that he was going to do this. We will not support this amendment.

[Business of Supply, April 19th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I believe that you will find unanimous consent for the following motion:

That at the conclusion of today's debate on the opposition motion in the name of the hon. member for Bourassa, all questions necessary to dispose of this motion be deemed put, a recorded division deemed requested and deferred to 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 24, 2007.

[Persons with Disabilities, April 18th, 2007]

I agree, Mr. Speaker, and Liberals will be voting yes.

[Committees of the House, April 18th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, Liberals present will be voting for this motion.

I would also like to point out that I will be adding the member for Hull—Aylmer who did not vote during the last vote as he was not in the chamber.

[Afghanistan, April 16th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, if the end of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan is really going to be the end of February 2009, notice will need to be given in just nine months from now.

Are Canadians really supposed to believe that the government has not even discussed an exit scenario or is the minister simply softening up Canadians for an extension of this mission?

[Afghanistan, April 16th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, Canada's military commitment in Afghanistan is supposed to end in February 2009, but the government is now indicating that it has no intention of honouring that timeline.

Last week the Minister of National Defence suggested that Canadian troops could be withdrawn from Afghanistan by possibly as late as 2015, and the minister also admitted that cabinet had not even discussed an exit strategy.

Why can the minister not be clear with Canadians about how and when this mission will conclude?