3 Billion! Just send in Brian Tobin!
COntinued
Harper unveils Arctic plan
Dec. 23, 2005. 01:00 AM
SEAN GORDON
OTTAWA BUREAU
$3.5B strategy aims to protect sovereignty
Would increase military presence, boost air patrols
WINNIPEG—Conservative Leader Stephen Harper wrapped up the opening phase of the election campaign exactly as he began it — with a policy announcement, this time on Arctic sovereignty — before winging off to Calgary for a short Christmas respite.
Though Harper intends to resume a light campaign schedule on Dec. 27, he will spend the bulk of the next 10 days with family, steeling himself for the sprint to the Jan. 23 finish.
Harper said he's pleased with the way his campaign has gone so far, but acknowledged there's "a lot of work to do in January."
"Our objective, we haven't been secret, in these three weeks has been to get out our platform, our priorities, our plans for the country," he said.
Harper said he expects an "extremely negative" post-holiday Liberal campaign, and that he will be prepared to fight back if need be.
"(The Liberal party) already has run a negative campaign, but I anticipate it will become a lot more expensive negative campaign in January, so we wanted to make sure we got our policies out now," he said.
Harper is going to spend most of next week in British Columbia and Alberta, but will attend small local gatherings and travel with a stripped-down entourage.
After a week spent pushing back against the perception the Liberals are best placed to handle the nettlesome issue of national unity, Harper yesterday set his sights on demonstrating his party will be able to assert Canada's continental role.
He unveiled the Tory strategy to protect Canada's Arctic sovereignty, a $3.5 billion plan that includes the construction of three new troop-carrying icebreakers, a remote-sensing system to detect the presence of foreign vessels, an Arctic army training centre, and a deep-water naval and civilian port in Iqaluit.
The party would also bolster air patrols, deploy unmanned drones in the region and increase the ranks of the Canadian Rangers, aboriginal militia who travel throughout the most remote areas of the Arctic.
"We would hope that an aggressive approach to our sovereignty would persuade countries to respect that sovereignty and to obviously deal with us before they send vessels in our water," Harper said, adding "sovereignty is something that you use it or you lose it."
Harper took special aim at the United States, continuing a move to dispel another perception: that the Conservatives are closely aligned with the Bush administration.
He said Canada would "want and expect" foreign ships, including those of the U.S. Navy, to advise and seek permission before entering Canadian waters.
He wouldn't talk about how far the Tories would go to enforce that demand. He said it will take at least five years before the first of the icebreakers — which he said would be Canadian-built — can take to the waters of the Northwest Passage.
COntinued