And I want to pick up a bit on what the Chancellor has just said, because it shows that we’re making progress on exactly those issues. And starting with collective security, it’s hard to overstate how important the commitment of Germany, Canada, other NATO partners to the 5% defence spending, the bold leadership of Germany in helping to make, your personal leadership in helping to make that happen for NATO as a whole, that 5% commitment. For Canada, to put it in context, this will represent a quadrupling of our defence expenditure between our last budget in 2024 and the end of this decade. Also with respect to collective security, it matters where we are and how we work. And Germany’s commitment in the Baltics and Lithuania. As the Chancellor just said, I will be traveling from here with colleagues to Latvia, where we have over 2,500 troops stationed and have been active over the course of the last decade.

And of course, again, and with your leadership through the E3 at the Coalition of the Willing, Canada’s participating in broader collective efforts to bring peace and security to Ukraine. Now we know that peace can only come through strength. That means strength in terms of sanctions against Russia and this illegal war. It means strength in reinforcing Ukrainian armed forces, which we are both doing in terms of materiel. And it means robust and credible security guarantees. And we had detailed discussions on those working through the modalities. We both, I will reiterate how much we welcome President Trump’s openness to U.S. participation to help align with the work of the Coalition of the Willing. With respect to defence, I just want to say a few words. That big increase in spending that we’re both doing. We’re very conscious, individually and collectively, on making sure that it’s as effective as possible, that spending is as effective as possible. And being effective starts with true partnerships. So, for Canada, it is very important that we are developed a security and defence partnership with the European Union, will help us to deliver on our NATO’s capability targets, particularly through participation in Europe’s security action for Europe or SAFE program is an instrument of ReArm for Europe.

And I want to thank the Chancellor for his personal support of Canada’s participation in this action plan. There are many tangible opportunities, and I’m going to highlight one. We are announcing today, this morning, that Canada is in the process. We’ve announced this fact previously. We’re in the process of renewing our submarine fleet. So, it is one of our most important defence initiatives. We’ve been running the process, as a wide range of interests in helping us with this. We have narrowed the list to two finalists, and I look forward, along with the Minister of Industry, Melanie Joly, who is here, and the Minister of National Defence. We will be visiting ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems facility in Kiel later today. So, the German-Norwegian Partnership is one of the two finalists for this, consistent with the cooperation potential that we have and consistent with Canada fully fulfilling its responsibilities on all three of our coasts, the Atlantic, the Pacific, and of course, the Arctic.

And the other factor I just wanted to highlight is our joint work to bring resiliency to supply chains. One of the big vulnerabilities that’s been exposed by the Ukraine war, was exposed by COVID, it’s been exposed by the changing global trade dynamics. Our vulnerabilities in supply chains, including in critical metals and minerals. Now, Germany has been amongst the leaders in beginning that diversification away from China, particularly China and Russia. Canada can play a role in accelerating that diversification for Germany and for Europe, and these issues are only going to become more important. There’s likely to be a four-fold increase in the demand for critical metals and minerals over the course of the next decade. 

So Germany and other leaders are trying to diversify their suppliers of critical minerals, Canada stands ready to answer their call.

We have a great wealth in terms of critical minerals, and together we can provide secure and reliable supplies so that our countries can position ourselves to become world leaders in this context.

Now, at the G7 Summit that the Chancellor mentioned a few months ago, in Kananaskis, in my home province of Alberta, the Chancellor and I and we are joined by others in developing a critical minerals action plan. Basically, for this diversification to happen, you need willing buyers as well as willing sellers. And we have an initiative to help develop and stockpile those critical minerals, and that, it’s in that context that the Minister of Natural Resources and his counterpart will be signing a joint declaration on intent on critical minerals cooperation. So, to accelerate innovation, investment and collaboration. And in this regard, we are already seeing progress, progress since our meeting in June. And I’m going to give just a couple of examples to make this tangible. Troilus Gold Company, which is a Canadian mining company, has signed a long-term copper supply agreement with Hamburg-based Aurubis AG, one of Europe’s leading smelter and recycling groups. In Quebec, Torngat Metals has entered into an MOU with VAC, which is a leader in global rare earth magnets, a lesson that our partners to the South, the Americans, have learned about the vulnerabilities in the rare earth magnet supply chain. So, we’re creating a rare earth magnet supply chain between Quebec, between Canada and Germany. And then in addition, Rock Tech Lithium, which is a Canadian-German clean tech company, accelerating decarbonization through a lithium agreement.

So, there’s high level declarations of intents, there’s action plans. But what really matters is these transactions at the bottom. If I could summarize, there’s a common theme. We’re moving from a world where there’s exposure to vulnerability, to vulnerability and instability is, I think, the norm in the global economy, global geopolitics. But countries like Germany, Canada, partnership with the European Union can provide stability and prosperity for our citizens. And this, whether it’s in what we’ve worked on today, whether it’s providing security guarantees, whether it’s Volkswagen’s investment in Ontario or Bombardier’s aircraft hub here in Frankfurt, these partnerships provides a rock and a foundation for that shared prosperity.