Senator McPhedran: Senator Gold, in addition to that inquiry, if you would, please ask for a reason. If we are not sending anyone to represent the Government of Canada to listen, to gather information and to come back, please ask why. Thank you.

Hon. Marilou McPhedran: Honourable senators, I would like to take a moment of my time to thank my colleagues Senator Yonah Martin and the other members of the Conservative caucus for very generously giving me this time today. As everybody knows, unaffiliated independent senators almost never get this chance, so I’m very grateful.

I’m also delighted to be able to speak today when guests from West Carleton Secondary School are with us, and I want to also salute our colleagues who have already spoken about the importance of youth engagement and youth participation in strengthening our democracy.

I met Hamza, who was the host from West Carleton at a reception that focused on lowering the federal voting age to 16. We got to talking, and I said that, “Yes, indeed, the Senate loves to have guests, and we particularly like to welcome young guests,” so this is the result of that conversation. Thank you, Hamza, for following up, and thank you to your student colleagues who are with us today.

On Monday this week, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute reported on the heightened tensions among the world’s nine nuclear-armed states. It is very much exacerbated by the illegal invasion by Russia of Ukraine and, of course, as we are all aware, by Putin’s threats to use nuclear weapons if he is not allowed to complete his genocide of the Ukrainian people.

Countries increasing their stockpiles of nuclear warheads included the U.K., which in 2021 announced its decision to increase the ceiling on its total warhead stockpile. This is a reversal of a decades-long trend since World War II. The increases that have been announced by a number of countries that have nuclear weapons come despite the fact that the UN Security Council — all five permanent members, in fact — made a statement just last year saying, “. . . nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.”

Yet, the nine nuclear-armed states spent $82.4 billion on their nuclear weapons in 2021, during a continuing global pandemic and only months before Russia began assembling troops on the border of Ukraine. This is an inflation-adjusted increase of $6.5 billion over the previous year.

This report is entitled Squandered: 2021 Global Nuclear Weapons Spending.

I want to note with great appreciation that more than 40 senators have signed on to the parliamentarian pledge to work to prohibit nuclear weapons, and next week is Nuclear Ban Week in Austria. Thank you very much.

Hon. Marilou McPhedran: Honourable senators, this is a question to the government leader, Senator Gold.

Senator Gold, my question follows on my previous question when I asked if Canada was going to join with other NATO members Norway and Germany in sending an observer delegation to Vienna next week for conferences hosted by the government of Austria. We got a tentative seemingly positive answer, but nothing firm, so I am asking again today.

This question comes in the context of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s nuclear threats and the nine nuclear-armed states spending $82 billion on nuclear weapons in 2021, an increase of more than $6 billion. The Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons will take place on June 20, and it will include a session reserved for parliamentarians. The conference will bring together states representatives, international organizations, scientists and civil society to look at the research on humanitarian consequences and risks of nuclear weapons. The next day, Austria is hosting the first meeting of the states parties that ratified the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons activated last year.

Senator Gold, why is Canada refusing to participate, failing to send parliamentary observers to these two historic and crucial conferences in the way that Norway and Germany are — also NATO members?