GOVERNMENT ADMITS REAL CRIMINALS NOT THE TARGET OF FIREARMS PROGRAM
“The Solicitor General says criminals are protected by the Privacy Act but not law-abiding gun owners!”
Ottawa – The government finally admitted that their billion-dollar firearms program is not the least bit interested in tracking real criminals who use firearms to commit their violent acts. This revelation was included in the government’s response to a written question tabled in the House of Commons by Garry Breitkreuz, Official Opposition Critic for Firearms and Property Rights. “There are 131,000 persons in Canada who have been prohibited from owning firearms by the courts, another 36,000 with active restraining orders and more than 9,000 persons who have had their firearms licences refused or revoked. The trouble is the government doesn’t make any attempt to track them so police will know where the bad guys actually are,” revealed Breitkreuz. “Two million law-abiding licenced firearms owners are required by the Firearms Act to report their change of address within 30 days or face up to two years in jail. But thousands of proven-to-be-dangerous persons are free to roam Canada without telling the police where they live. This is absurd!”
Even more alarming, says Breitkreuz, is the government’s reason for not requiring these criminals to report their change of address. “The government says that tracking the criminals prohibited from owning firearms is not necessary to manage the firearms program, and therefore these convicted criminals are protected by the Privacy Act. This is ludicrous,” exclaimed Breitkreuz. Yesterday, when Breitkreuz asked the Solicitor General to explain why the Privacy Act protects these convicted criminals but two million licenced firearms owners are not, Wayne Easter ducked the question. “He may be able to duck questions in the House of Commons, but he won’t be able to duck the Charter challenges that will inevitably be launched because of this fundamental violation of privacy rights of law-abiding citizens,” predicted Breitkreuz.
The Solicitor General also reported to the House that criminals who have been prohibited from owning firearms cannot own or register firearms. “What is he smoking? Statistics Canada reports show that in the year 2001, 460 persons prohibited from owning firearms under Section 117.01 of the Criminal Code were charged for violating their prohibition order. One hundred and twenty-five persons prohibited from owning firearms were also charged with a violent offence in 2001,” reported Breitkreuz. “To be effective, firearm prohibition orders, restraining orders and firearms licence refusals have to be enforced and monitored. This takes police on the street and effective laws - not hundreds of paper pushing bureaucrats running a useless gun registry. The government is clearly targeting the wrong people with their fatally flawed firearms legislation.”
“The Auditor General’s December 2002 report attributed much of the excessive cost overruns for the firearms program was due to the fact that, “…the Program's focus had changed from high risk firearms owners to excessive regulation and enforcement of controls over all owners and their firearms.” Breitkreuz disagreed, “What the Solicitor General’s statements prove is that the firearms program totally ignores ‘high risk’ firearms owners altogether and focuses exclusively on the two million ‘no risk or low risk’ gun owners.”
I resent being treated like a criminal while real criminals are treated better than law-abiding citizens. The government has its whole scheme all backwards. An Alliance government will repeal and replace Bill C-68 with something that makes operational, legal, economic and common sense. How much more evidence do we need is to prove that Bill C-68 has nothing to do with controlling the criminal use of firearms?” asked Breitkreuz.
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