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The Liberal government has ruled out any significant budget increases for defence. Instead, it has promised a comprehensive defence review to create the first defence white paper in more than 20 years, with a plan to making the military “leaner, more agile.”

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Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan confirmed Tuesday that one of the things the government will be looking at is the size of the force.

“It’s going to look not just look at the procurement, it’s going to look at our number of forces, how it connects into our global footprint,” he told reporters outside the House of Commons. “We want to make sure that the Defence Review is done in a manner that sets us ­ Canada up for the next 10, 20 years and how we fit as part of the world.”

The Conservatives were sensitive about reducing the size of the military after criticizing previous Liberal governments for doing exactly that in the 1990s.

But the Tories’ refusal to reduce the number of personnel in uniform at the same time it was cutting billions of dollars in defence spending put a disproportionate amount of budgetary pressure on other parts of the military, including maintenance and procurement.

One former defence chief, retired general Rick Hillier, warned in 2013 that reducing the size of the military was the only way to ensure the force remained strong and stable. He said the number of full-time members should be reduced from 68,000 to 50,000.

Most analysts agree that the mandated staffing levels and planned procurement projects are unsustainable under the current defence budget.

“Something has to give,” said Perry, who has estimated that cutting the size of the force by 1,000 regular-force members would save about $105 million a year.

National Defence also reported that it was short about 2,200 civilian employees, against an authorized strength of more than 24,000. The Conservative government did not have a target for the number of civilian workers, though it did put a priority on employing those in uniform.