Madam Speaker, I appreciate member's mentioning the contributions to the Canadian Forces in Afghanistan, and all those who have served. There are about 40,000 Canadian soldiers that were there, from what I understand.
If the Conservative Party really felt this was the type of debate that should be taking place, it could do it through a take-note debate or an emergency debate. There are different forms that would have enabled the debate to take place. The member himself could have been speaking to this and introducing it. That might have given it a bit more credibility.
There is absolutely no doubt that we, as a government, had no idea the opposition was going to be bringing forward this concurrence debate. That is why I believe this is another example of the Conservatives using concurrence motions as a way to frustrate government legislation.