Printed from www.owensoundsuntimes.com web site Friday, January 24, 2003 - © 2003 Owen Sound Sun Times
Cops won't enforce gun registry laws
Bill Henry
Friday, January 24, 2003 - 08:00
Local news - Ontario’s police chiefs want the federal gun registry put
on hold.
The “billion dollar boondoggle” is in such disarray that police in the
province will not be charging people who have yet to register their guns, Owen
Sound police chief Tom Kaye said.
“It wouldn’t be right to prosecute someone under the circumstances,” said
Kaye, who is also president of the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police.
The association will request the federal government to “step back from the gun
registry,” in a letter early next week, he told the Owen Sound Police Services
Board Thursday.
The deadline for registering guns under Bill C-68 was Dec. 31.
Almost six million guns were registered, leaving an estimated one-quarter of
firearms in Canada still unregistered at the time.
Meant to cost about $2 million, the registry is said now to be approaching $1
billion, with hundreds of people still unable to register guns or contact
officials, Kaye said.
“We’re not saying they should mothball the project, but there needs to be an
independent review. Why has this gone so far off the rails?”
Kaye said the police chiefs still support most aspects of the legislation,
including safe storage rules and stiffer training and licence requirements for
gun owners, but the out-of-control registry is impossible now to enforce and has
lost credibility.
Bill C-68 has been controversial from the beginning.
Opposition ballooned after the federal auditor general questioned the cost,
saying it looked like a $2-million program could cost $1 billion.
Eight provincial governments and three territories have since called on the
federal government to stop the registry.
Ontario’s attorney general has asked the province’s police to use discretion
in charging anyone under the new registration law. The association has taken
that further and said no one will be charged until the mess is sorted out, Kaye
said.
“There are significant problems. It’s not doing what it was meant to do at
the outset,” Kaye told reporters after the board meeting Thursday. “We
believe the only way to resolve it is an independent review.”