National Defence committee  Every effort is being made, Mr. Chairman, to address some of the concerns that the member has raised. It's not only a concern to Canada, but it's a concern to all the partners. We need to make sure that we can get parts when we need them, where we need them, and that's an essential part of this.

National Defence committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We're working with our other partners on developing a global sustainment solution that will allow for the delivery of a part to Canada, anywhere in North America, in 24 hours, and anywhere around the world in 72 hours. There are going to be warehouses established around the world with joint strike fighter airplane parts that will be sent out, much like Walmart does right now, to points where they're required in real time.

National Defence committee  I can do it in 25 seconds. We're looking at a range of different opportunities to cooperate with our partners on this program in the whole sustainment area. One of the things we're looking at doing, for example, is pooling our spare parts with the other partners. This alone could yield a 47% reduction in the number of spare parts that we would have to buy over the life of our program.

National Defence committee  I'll take that one, Mr. Chairman. Actually, both Lockheed Martin and the joint strike fighter project office have done a rigorous analysis of the supply chain. Redundancy has been built in. There are many second sources of supply for the 40 critical components on the aircraft.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman, all the partners have equal opportunities when it comes to a lot of the production opportunities that are flowing from the program. These opportunities flow to the Government of Canada. They are entertained by Industry Canada and distributed. We identify Canadian suppliers that can meet the requirements of the program, and we provide that information back to Lockheed Martin to ensure that our suppliers are on the receiving end of the request for proposals that are distributed by the program.

National Defence committee  The total number of airplanes that will be bought by the partnership is 3,173. That's exclusive of any airplanes that are bought by third parties like Israel, which will add to the number. The total expected buy of joint strike fighters is anticipated to be around 5,000 over the life of the program, making this probably the last major manned tactical aircraft program that we'll see certainly in this century.

National Defence committee  We do, but I can't provide that particular number to you.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman, that's an excellent question. A number of Canadian companies have developed software for the JSF program. I bring your attention, and I think it was referred to in earlier testimony, to the company NGRAIN in Vancouver. NGRAIN's technology is actually going to be used for monitoring the maintenance of the low observable stealth codings on the joint strike fighter, not only for Canada but for all the partners.

National Defence committee  The MOU is available on a website. We can provide that website to the committee. We can also, if desired, actually table the MOU if needed. But it is available. It's been publicly available since 2006.

National Defence committee  Thank you, Mr. Ross. The reality is that if we do withdraw from the current MOU, we will have to negotiate a withdrawal fee with all the other partners. What that fee would be would be determined by negotiations with the other partners, but there certainly would be a cost associated with the withdrawal from the MOU.

National Defence committee  Mr. Harris, that's the last MOU we did sign with the other partners. It was the production, sustainment, and follow-on development MOU, and it was signed in 2006.

National Defence committee  Yes, sir, that's correct.