NEWS
RELEASE
October 29, 2003
For Immediate Release
FIREARMS
COMMISSIONER ADMITS HE DOESN’T KNOW
HOW
POLICE ARE USING THE GUN REGISTRY
Ottawa
– Garry Breitkreuz, Official Opposition Critic for Firearms and Property
Rights had to wait to read the transcript of last week’s Justice Committee
meeting to confirm an unbelievable statement from the new Commissioner of
Firearms, William V. Baker. “He
testified that the police use the gun registry system 1,500 times a day but
later admitted that he didn’t know how the police were using the registry
information,” reported the Saskatchewan MP.
“Even more alarming was that he went on to admit that it would probably
take two more years to get the answer.”
In
response to another Breitkreuz question, Mr. Baker also admitted that police
wouldn’t know where the registered guns are because there is no requirement in
the legislation for gun owners to report where their firearms are stored or who
their firearms are loaned to.
The
Justice Committee was meeting to review 44 pages of draft regulations to the Firearms
Act. The meeting was convened
as a result of a motion introduced by Breitkreuz on October 21st.
“Committee work can be a real grind, but the testimony of the new
Commissioner of Firearms should raise a big red flag whenever the government
cites statistics about the gun registry,” said Breitkreuz.
“This
admission also confirms what we had already discovered by another ‘no
records’ response to one of our Access to Information Act requests
in June,” reported Breitkreuz. “If
they’re going to brag about the number of times the police are using the
registry, they should at least be able to back up their statements with valid
statistics and they can’t.”
“It’s
an outrage that Canadian taxpayers will have to spend another $200 to $300
million and wait another two years before the government is able to tell us
specifically whether the gun registry is of any real benefit to police or if it
is keeping guns out of the hands of criminals as they promised,” exclaimed
Breitkreuz.
NOTE: Testimony of William V. Baker,
Firearms Commissioner
http://www.cssa-cila.org/garryb/publications/bakerstestimony10-23-2003.htm
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