This week in a Defence Committee meeting I took issue with the refusal of our Defence Minister to release an estimated cost of the bombing mission in Iraq. This article gets into some details on the issue. Heres an excerpt: Defence Minister Rob Nicholson has refused to release cost estimates for the mission, even though commanders have provided the government with the potential price tag. “This government just doesn’t feel that they have any responsibility to be accountable on this stuff,” NDP MP Robert Chisholm told the Star Thursday, adding that “Canadians deserve better than this.” “Canadians are concerned with what happens in the world and the role that this country plays in it but they’re not stupid and they don’t want to be taken for granted,” he said. Nicholson told a Commons committee on Tuesday that taxpayers will likely have to wait until months after the operation is over before they learn what it cost. Just over a month into the mission, the defence minister said it’s tough to predict what the cost will be once it ends. “When the costs are known we will table them in the usual way,” Nicholson told the defence committee. “To be exact at the beginning of a mission as to exactly what a mission will cost is always challenging.” That response sparked a sharp rebuke from Chisholm at the meeting, who asked why the government is refusing to “come clean” on the cost of the mission. “Why is it that you think it’s not your responsibility to be accountable here,” Chisholm told Nicholson on Tuesday.
Posted on: Sat, 29 Nov 2014 14:47:01 +0000
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