NOTE:
Versions of this story also appeared in: The Edmonton Journal and the Victoria
Times-Colonist.
PUBLICATION:
The
Ottawa Citizen
DATE:
2003.02.19
EDITION:
Final
SECTION: News
PAGE:
A8
BYLINE:
Tim Naumetz
SOURCE:
The Ottawa Citizen
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Speaker's
ruling proves Commons, public misled over gun registry tab: MP
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A
Commons ruling by Speaker Peter Milliken suggests the Justice Department misled
the public and Parliament last December in a controversy over new funding for
the federal firearms registry, says the Canadian Alliance.
Mr.
Milliken's ruling this week in a dispute over the government's decision to drop
a request for $72 million in supplementary funding for the program contradicts
the department's claim in December that the money was part of its original
year-long spending estimate of $113 million.
Alliance
MP Garry Breitkreuz said yesterday the contradictory positions show that Justice
Minister Martin Cauchon misled the Commons in the dustup over the gun registry
last year and should resign.
While
rejecting a claim from Liberal MP Roger Gallaway that a Commons decision to
withdraw the Justice Department's request for extra funding should have halted
the firearms program, Mr. Milliken ruled the department was asking Parliament
for additional money in December. Had the additional funding been approved, the
total cost of the program for the year would have been nearly $200 million.
A
spokesman for the Canadian Firearms Centre, David Austin, denied at the time
that the $72 million was new funding. He said it was included in the original
spending estimate of $113 million for the fiscal year 2002-03.
Mr.
Cauchon obtained agreement from the opposition to reduce the supplementary
estimate request to zero.
The
government withdrew the request after Auditor General Sheila Fraser disclosed
the cost of the program was ballooning to a forecast $1 billion by 2005.
Ms.
Fraser accused the Justice Department of hiding the true cost of the program
from taxpayers.
Mr. Austin continued to insist yesterday that the department was not requesting additional money in December, saying it had planned all along to spend $113 million over the year, but intended to request $72 million of that money through supplementary estimates. Asked if Mr. Milliken was wrong, Mr. Austin said only that the two sides were "at variance.