Algoma-Manitoulin-Kapuskasing MP, Carol Hughes writes a regular column about initiatives and issues impacting our community.
Government ministers have been tasked with finding $15 billion in government spending cuts as they attempt to reign in spending and look for ways to cut discretionary waste between 2023 and 2028. Budget 2023 laid out plans for the government to find that savings over this five-year period by cutting consulting fees, travel, and other discretionary professional services by 15 per cent, and reducing departmental spending by three per cent. Among those departments that are expected to substantially reduce their spending is the Department of National Defence (DND). While plans to cut wasteful spending are laudable, those cuts cannot come at the expense of service members and their families.
DND's main estimates for the 2023-24 fiscal year show a total budget of $26.5 billion. Top military brass, including General Wayne Eyre, the Chief of the Defence Staff, have voiced concerns about the cost-cutting exercise, saying at the House of Commons Defence Committee “There's no way that you can take almost a billion dollars out of the defence budget and not have an impact. This is something that we're wrestling with now." While the Defence Minister has stated repeatedly that the cost-cutting exercise is not a budget cut (and in some ways, he may technically be correct, given anticipated increases in the department’s budget to $39.7 billion in 2026-27) there are some serious concerns about how any cuts won’t result in impacts to service members.
We are clearly in the midst of an era where military preparedness is of vital concern. While Canada has not been at war since we withdrew from Afghanistan in 2014, global conflicts in Ukraine and now in Israel mean that we need to be adequately prepared for the future.
New measures have been put in place this year to military personnel’s housing allowances, also known as the Post Living Differential (PLD). The soldier’s housing formula has changed from being based on where they are posted to a salary-based allowance. This change would save the government an estimated $30 million per year, but the cost isn’t worth the pain it’s causing for our service men and women.
A recent memo to General Eyre from Chaplain General Guy Bélisle laid out the challenges that this change causes. It states “The past six months have been very difficult for many CAF members and their families as they struggle to find a way forward through the economic, social and cultural realities and changes that are confronting all Canadians in these uncertain times.” Additionally, the memo states: “The morale of members across the CAF was assessed by chaplains in this reporting period to be notably lower than during the last few reporting periods, due to several key factors and realities ... changes to PLD, the increasing lack of affordable housing, the rising cost of living, and staff shortages all contributed to exacerbating the tensions and challenges being experienced by members and their families.”
While not the main source of cutbacks to DND, changes to the PLA system are clearly having a negative impact on the well-being of serving families. The Canadian Forces are already having a hard time recruiting people, with an estimated 10,000 vacant positions. Making it harder to get appropriate accommodations isn’t going to help recruiting efforts.
Part of the problem we now find ourselves in is due to poor long-term planning for military spending. The previous Conservative government tied our hands with the purchase of F-35s, a plane that comes with an exorbitant price tag and serious concerns about its ability to meet our military’s needs. While the Prime Minister had campaigned on scrapping the purchase in 2015, this year, his government committed to a $19 billion contract with Lockheed-Martin to purchase 88 F-35s. So while DND is being asked, like other departments, to make spending cuts, it’s unreasonable to think that other departments are being asked to cut while also having a $19 billion dollar earmark on the books.
The basic principle behind cutting administrative costs in government departments is fine. Clearly, there’s some waste that can and should be cut. It’s hard to argue about the costs of travel for meetings when we’ve all gotten used to Zoom over the past several years. But cost-saving measures should never be placed on the backs of service members and their families.