Senator Dagenais: Delays and bureaucracy are two factors that sometimes slow down the procurement of equipment for our Armed Forces. Those delays have cost Canadian taxpayers a fortune since this government came to power. Why doesn’t Canada have a procurement department exclusively for Department of Defence requirements, like Britain does, with experts who know what they’re doing, instead of sometimes granting contracts to consultants?

Hon. Jim Quinn: Minister, I have a quick question. Minister Blair, with his Department of National Defence, or DND, portfolio, says a billion dollars is going to be taken out of that department. However, we have men and women in the Canadian Armed Forces who are tasked to respond here at home, and also increasingly in different locations around the world. Can we have assurance that the government and your department will not interfere with — will promote, in fact — the procurement of necessary equipment? I ask because the Canadian Armed Forces have an equipment issue.