The Critic for National Defence for the Official Opposition has an issue with the Liberal government's desire to engage in sole sourcing for a new fighter jet. James Bezan says it's a broken promise made during the Liberal's election campaign.

"The government of Canada is considering the sole source for the F18 Super Hornet, which is a US built aircraft by Boeing. They promised to have an open and fair competition. So, this flies in the face of their election promise. But I know they're trying to honour the other part of that election promise, which was to not not buy the F35."

Bezan says the F35 seems to be the better jet.

"As we see in all the competitions that have been held around the world, and amongst our allies, the F35 continues to win all those competitions, and most recently in Denmark only two weeks ago. The real issue there, though, is that the government is not honouring its promises. Most people know the F35 has contractors around the world building pieces, including in Winnipeg Bristol Magellan Aerospace, is building the vertical tail section of the F35. Even though we haven't bought a single plane yet, we have over 70 companies that have built over close to a billion dollars worth of equipment and components for the F35 consortium."

He notes some of the excuses he claims the Liberals are making.

"They've also vented this issue that there's going to be a capability gap, that our current fleet of CF18s will not fly until 2025 in time for a replacement aircraft to show up. Which again is completely imaginary. The commander of the Royal Canadian air force general Michael Hood told Parliament just two months ago that there would be no problem in continuing to fly our CF18s until 2025. The conservative government invested $400 million in upgrading and extending the life of our CF18s, so the liberals are trying to put together a narrative to support the position of sole source. And we want to make sure they make the decision that is what's best for our men and women in uniform, which is in the best interests of tax payers. And ultimately also support Canadian jobs."

Bezan says the biggest issue is the broken election promise.

"It's the sole source. The broken promise. They said they were going to have an open and fair competition. If they did that, I think all Canadians would be comfortable that all the proper terms of reference of competition would be honoured and respected, That all interested parties, whether it's F35, whether it's Boeing the Super Hornet, or the Eurofighter, or the Raphael out of Europe, or even the Griffin made by Saab in Sweden, that every company would have a chance to bid, present their case, and then the rate officials could make their selection s as to what is the best plane for Canada, and weigh in on everything from regional industrial benefits, to performance, to life cycle cost, to acquisition costs, and then we know that we are getting the best plane. But by going sole sourcing they have really looked at this as a rigged process. And as we know through the lobby registry, that Boeing has had unfettered access to Liberal ministers on this file. And half those meetings have been with the senior policy advisor over in the minister of defences office. Compare that to the other competitors, and I can tell you that Lockheed Martin, Raphael, Eurofighter can't even get through the front door. There's definitely privileges at work her and I don't think that's in the best interest of taxpayer,s and definitely flies in the face of the campaign promise by the Liberals to have an open transparent and fair competition. "

He adds the Liberals realized they pushed things a bit too far.

"Definitely we saw a change today in the answers and tone coming from the minister of defence, saying that no decisions have been made. I think they're stating to read the tea leaves and have seen enough push-back in the media already. And Canadians of course are asking questions, as we have been as the official opposition. They are realizing it's quite an unpopular decision to go out and sole source when the campaign was against sole sourcing."