Business of Supply  Madam Chair, I would like to hear the minister's thoughts on maintaining Canada's special operations forces. In light of the changes to Canada's missions, which are being aligned with those of the UN, does the minister think that our special operations forces are still necessary?

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, in the beginning, we spoke a bit about Canada's military bases. Could the minister confirm today that he does not intend to close or shrink the Bagotville base in Quebec?

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, with respect to the bases, can the minister confirm that no reserve units or armouries will be shut down?

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, earlier, we spoke about threats to Canada. During our visit to NORAD, my NDP colleague had a different perspective than I and my Liberal colleagues did. I would like the minister to tell us how Canada can protect itself against a direct or indirect missile attack, since we are in the path between North Korea, Russia, and the United States.

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, indeed, many of these conversations about national defence need to be held in private. I fully understand that. I want to get back to the budget and budget cuts. We do not know whether there are any budget cuts. Our colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence, gave a brilliant presentation.

Business of Supply  I hear you, I am a Conservative, I am a slow learner.

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, we are told that $3.7 billion was deferred. Then we learned from the Ottawa Citizen that the Arctic offshore patrol ship project was cut by $173 million, the CF-18 program was cut by $109 million, the Cyclone helicopter project was cut by $90 million, the program to modernize our Halifax-class frigates was cut by $71 million, and the integrated soldier system project was cut by $39.4 million.

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, the minister and I both know that the reserve units are currently experiencing a lot of budget problems. Will the minister take action to ensure that the money that is allocated to reserve forces and specific units gets to them and that cuts are made elsewhere instead, if necessary?

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, with regard to the use of class A and class B budgets, when the government whip was a lieutenant general, he wrote “The Report on Transformation 2011”. At that time, he recommended that class B reserve budgets be cut by 50%. Does the minister agree with the recommendation that the whip made at that time?

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, with regard to the recruitment of reservists, in 1994, a former Liberal government created what is known as the total force. The goal at the time was to merge the regular forces and the reserve forces into one operations group. Over the years, we finally realized that the reserve forces had problems, particularly with regard to recruitment.

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, I knew that the minister would understand the problems of reserve forces like I do. I am pleased to see that we can agree on this matter. In the last year that the Conservative government was in power, we gave the directive to increase the number of reservists to 28,500 over the next four years.

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, the parliamentary secretary almost put me to sleep with his fine words. Just kidding. As a veteran, I am getting to know the minister, and I also recognize his human qualities and experience. He is a man who wants to do things well. He is a good man. In another time, I would have gone to war with him.

Business of Supply  Madam Chair, the report of the Auditor General that was published two weeks ago contained a section on the Canadian army reserve. That report shows that, when the budget is submitted at the beginning of the year, not all of the money that is specifically allocated to the reserve forces is going to them.

Marc Dauphin  Mr. Speaker, on May 6, the Collège des médecins du Québec presented Dr. Marc Dauphin with its 2016 humanist award for his contribution to war medicine and for the remarkable work he has done in Quebec, Canada, and throughout the world. After completing a medical degree at Université Laval, Dr.

National Defence  Mr. Speaker, 21 years ago, the Liberals and Jean Chrétien closed Royal Military College Saint-Jean, which they felt was no longer needed. The former Conservative government remedied the situation by reopening the institution in 2008 and promising to reinstate university studies.