Thank you very much.
I've had a chance to listen to some of the testimony at the committee on this issue, but I'll leave my remarks to questions regarding general issues surrounding defence procurement in this country.
I want to focus on two things. The first one is a puzzlement in my mind. This relates to the F-15 decision, if it is the decision. One the one hand the government seems to say it's going to buy the F-35, but somehow this Gripen is still on the hook. What I fear is that we're going to have a repeat....
One of the interesting things about defence procurement in Canada is that these things keep repeating themselves and we don't learn any lessons. What I mean by this is, if you go back to the late 1970s and the decision to acquire the CF-18, that was delayed because of an attempt to play off General Dynamics and the F-16 against the F-18 by Martin Marietta, in order to improve what was known then as “regional industrial benefits”.
The second thing related to this puzzle, to me, is this degree of seven months to a year of future negotiations. I'm not sure what is going to be negotiated here. If you recall, we are a member of the partnership on F-35s, with Lockheed Martin and many other countries. We have signed memorandums of understanding with the consortium regarding production, sustainment and follow-on development, which are to govern purchases and related sustainment and follow-on development. I would add that follow-on development and spares are going to be done on a cost-sharing basis. What is there to negotiate, if this is already in place and it should basically be an easy decision to move forward quickly?
The only thing that I can think of is that the government, National Defence, PSWGC—Public Works, or whatever they call themselves now; I can never remember—is perhaps looking to negotiate a repair and overhaul maintenance capability in Canada. That may be the objective. I'm not sure how that fits into the MOU. I'm not sure how the other allies who are partners and have acquired the F-35 have managed this. I would assume that would be the template for Canada to deal with this issue as well.
It remains a puzzle where exactly we're going. Are we going to delay another year after all the delays that have occurred? I think this is extremely problematic.
I also want to comment on estimates. I went back and looked at the estimates from 2011 and 2012 and the big debate on the F-35: the Auditor General's report, National Defence's response and the parliamentary budget office. I find it really interesting and strange, and it tells us something about this estimate problem.
The amount agreed upon between National Defence and the Auditor General's office, in 2012, was basically higher to purchase 65 aircraft than the amount that the government has now announced of $19.1 billion, I believe it is, to purchase more aircraft. This should raise big questions on the part of the committee about exactly how reliable the estimate process is.
Finally, on air defence as a whole, I fear that the F-35 decision and the replacement of the North Warning System are really problematic, as are the other elements of air defence purchases on the future surface combatant. For the army, it's too much a reflection of silo-based interests rather than a broad strategic perspective on the requirements of North American air.
I would add that what we're really talking about here is missile defence. You can't look at this in terms of those particular two things. There are much bigger things about integrating all of the domains and capabilities, along with networking and all of the issues that come out of that. To consider air defence procurement for North America and the Canadian Forces, this needs to be a much bigger picture than what we're currently getting.
I'll close my remarks there.