Auditor general shoots down Liberal fighter jet plan

Thank goodness for Canada’s auditor general, Michael Ferguson.

At a time when politicians and bureaucrats are shielded by well-paid public relations staff, this vigilant federal watchdog continues to sniff out what’s rotten in Ottawa while pointing to boondoggles across the nation.

Two recent alerts sounded by this diligent public servant prove why Canadians need him.

First, the auditor has shown that Justin Trudeau’s Liberals are as incapable of providing the country’s air force with the fighter jets it needs as Stephen Harper’s Conservatives were before them.

How the Liberals loved roasting those Tories for their stumbling attempts to replace the military’s aging fleet of CF-18 Hornet fighter jets.

So knee-jerk is the Liberal blame-game that following the release of the auditor’s damning report, Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan wagged his finger at his Conservative predecessors, remarking that, “This is what happens when you don’t put enough resources into the military.”

Spare us the excuses, Minister Sajjan. Your Liberals have been in power more than three years. The Conservatives are ancient history. Your government’s gross mishandling of the fighter jet file is today’s news.

Part of the problem is the aging jets themselves. They’re 35 years old and increasingly hard to maintain.

The last major refurbishment of the war-fighting equipment on these Cold War relics happened in 2008. Department of National Defence planners have done almost nothing to improve them since then because they expected the jets to be replaced by 2020.

Of course, that won’t happen. The Liberals aren’t expected to launch the $19-billion competition for 88 new fighter jets until next spring. A winner won’t be picked until 2021 or 2022, and the first new jet won’t be delivered until 2025.

Meanwhile, the government is spending $500 million on 25 second-hand Australian fighter jets to bolster its increasingly antiquated fleet of CF-18s.

But as the auditor general discovered, the Canadian Forces don’t have enough pilots to fly the planes they already have, or enough technicians to keep them in the air.

And despite the Liberals’ plan to spend roughly $3 billion over the next decade to keep the CF-18s and used Australian planes in the air, the auditor warns these fighter jets will become increasingly obsolete. That’s largely because the government has earmarked no money to upgrade the planes’ combat systems.

But these are planes Canada will use to defend itself and honour its strategic commitments until 2032, when they will quite literally be ready to become museum exhibits.

No wonder the auditor’s report concluded the government’s current plans “will pose a risk to Canada’s ability to contribute to Norad and NATO operations.”

If that makes Canadians feel a little defenceless, the auditor’s review of Canada Revenue Agency operations will leave them fuming.

The auditor says the agency goes easy on wealthy Canadians with offshore bank accounts while coming down hard on ordinary taxpayers.

The wealthy get more time to find receipts and often get their penalties waived. If salaried employees can’t find a receipt, it’s automatically disallowed and they’re reassessed. The rich stay rich. The ordinary pay more. It’s an ugly double standard.

Those ordinary Canadians owe Michael Ferguson a debt of thanks for standing up for them.

As for the government, its remedial work is cut out for it.