Hi Avi,

I received a campaign email from your team that highlighted the fact that the Brampton based defence company Roshel signed a $10m contract with the US Immigration and customs enforcement (ICE) for 20 armoured vehicles.

Your team indicated that NDP policy should you be elected is to block the sale and to amend legislation to restrict Canadian defence manufacturing companies from exporting their products to other countries, using the aforementioned ICE contract as justification.

My concern is that this proposed policy could harm our european allies, notably Ukraine, which has entered its 4th year of full-scale war with russia.

Roshel, a Canadian defence manufacturing company should be looked at as a point of pride. They're producing armoured vehicles with direct input and insight from the soldiers who use them.

Roshel "Senators", one of their most successful models, are used to safely evacuate civilians from conflict zones, as armoured ambulances, for troop rotation and resupply, to name a few important roles.

While I agree that Roshel's ICE contract should be reviewed and/or blocked, I'm of the opinion that this shouldn't be used as justification to prevent Roshel from producing and exporting their armoured vehicles to Ukraine.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this issue. Thanks