A
motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.
*
* *
Mr.
Garry Breitkreuz (Yorkton--Melville, Canadian Alliance):
Mr. Speaker, on March 19 of this year the Minister of Justice must have
misunderstood my question because he did not answer it. In fact, just after
asking him specifically about the fact that the $700 million gun registry had
already lost track of over 38,000 licensed firearms owners, he responded by
stating “The gun registry system works well”. The minister called losing
track of 38,629 licensed gun owners working well. Just a year after his
bureaucrats claimed that they had licensed all the gun owners in Canada, they
cannot find more than 38,000 of them.
Was
not the whole point of the registry to help police identify homes with guns in
them? Now the justice department cannot even tell police where these 38,000 gun
owners live. An internal Department of Justice document dated January 9, 2001,
revealed that only 600,000 of the 900,000 guns registered in the old RCMP
restricted weapons registry system would be re-registered by the end of 2002.
This would leave 300,000 previously registered firearms that would be declared
as unclaimed by the minister's department. The RCMP and the Department of
Justice have also lost track of 300,000 restricted and prohibited weapons
registered in the 68 year old handgun registry.
On March 19 I asked the minister to explain how the police can rely on a
gun registry that is missing hundreds of thousands of guns and tens of thousands
of gun owners. The House is still waiting for the answer.
Last week my office received new information from the RCMP that there are
49,000 individuals from British Columbia listed in the restricted weapons
registry system who do not hold a valid firearms acquisition certificate and who
also have failed to apply for a possession and acquisition licence as required
by the Criminal Code of Canada. This is despite a penalty of up to 10 years in
jail for knowingly being in unauthorized possession of a firearm.
The justice minister's new $700 million gun registry is suffering from
the same problems that made the 68 year old handgun registry totally useless at
solving and preventing crime. Gun owners fail to report their changes of
address. Gun owners die and the government loses track of the owners and the
guns they used to own. Gun owners and bureaucrats make mistakes on forms. As a
consequence, the information in the gun registry is so riddled with errors that
it has been deemed useless by the courts for determining who actually owns the
firearms listed in the registry.
On February 28 I released a report titled “Errors, Errors and More
Errors”, which listed 24 different types of errors being reported to my office
and in the newspapers. Today I issued a second report titled “Errors Just Keep
Piling Up in the Gun Registry”. Today's report listed 14 different types of
errors.
I do not have time to go through all of this, but I will give an example.
The justice department's own documents show error rates of 71% in firearms
licensing and 91% in the gun registry. The RCMP admits in access to information
documents that it is responsible for but not in control of the gun registry
processing. Why has the RCMP been removed from this important task? The RCMP has
68 years of experience in registering guns.
I think it is incumbent on the government to begin to explain why it is
plowing ahead with this.
¼
(1830)
Mr.
Paul Harold Macklin (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and
Attorney General of Canada, Lib.):
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for Yorkton--Melville for the
opportunity to rise in the House today and provide some context for his
comments. The initiatives we have taken to encourage early firearm registration
have obviously worked. With almost nine months left before the deadline, over
1.1 million of the 1.8 million licensed firearms owners, about two-thirds, have
already participated in this registration process.
The hon. member is aware that not all mail we send is received by its
intended recipient. Some people have not filed an address change and, as the
hon. member has mentioned, others have passed away. In fact, national media have
reported that a large number of leadership ballots were returned to the Canadian
Alliance as undeliverable. This is a common everyday occurrence that we do
accept as part of the ongoing difficulties with any system. It is the
responsibility of the firearms licence holders to report any change in address
just as they must do for their driver's licence.
This is a public safety program. As such, it is much more than just a gun
registry program. It is a multifaceted, practical approach that addresses the
prevention of firearms deaths and injuries and crime deterrence. Screening all
gun owners through licensing and tracking firearms along with minimum sentencing
help deter, prevent and prosecute firearms crime.
It is clear that the firearms program is already successful. That is why
Canada's law enforcement community recognizes and supports the firearms program
as an important part of public safety. That is why national law enforcement
organizations continue to support the Firearms Act. We are pleased that we are
already seeing real life examples of the registry helping police fight crime.
Information in the licensing and registration system will allow police to take
preventive action. For example, officers can remove firearms when responding to
domestic violence calls and they can more easily enforce court issued firearm
prohibition orders.
Our government's continuing commitment is to public safety. I would like
to thank the hon. member for Yorkton--Melville for the opportunity to bring
these facts to the attention of the House.
Mr.
Garry Breitkreuz:
Mr. Speaker, I need more than just one minute to respond, because the inaccuracy
that has just been displayed is unbelievable.
For example, to say that it is successful when less than 1.5 million gun
owners have complied with this or tried to get a licence really is a joke. How
many gun owners are there in Canada? The government does not even know. Is it
two million, three million, six million? It has spent $700 million already and
has barely scratched the surface as far as its stated task is concerned.
He made a comparison to the Canadian Alliance having a voting system that
uses the mail system and having many of those envelopes returned. It is not a
criminal offence not to vote in a Canadian Alliance election, but it is a
criminal offence, with a penalty of five to ten years, for not complying with
the program. To compare the two is absolutely ridiculous.
The answer to the question does not show how this prevents deaths. That
is the whole point. The errors in the system make the whole system completely
useless as far as prosecuting or preventing crime in any way is concerned.
I wish I had more time to elaborate on this, but the answer I got does
not address the question I have, that is, how, with all the errors in the
system, does it prove to be useful to the police in any way?
¼
(1835)
Mr.
Paul Harold Macklin:
Mr. Speaker, there are two parts to this program. I think the hon. member does
not take into consideration the importance of one very initial program, that is,
how individuals are actually trained in how to look after and maintain their
firearms. Whether or not they are registered or whether for the moment we do not
have their addresses in the records, we have instilled within those people the
knowledge and ability to properly look after, care for, store and deal with
firearms. That is very important. I think the hon. member appreciates how
important it is that everyone who has firearms knows how to deal with them in a
proper and effective manner.
For those people who have registered, are licensed and have now disappeared in the system, I know they are law-abiding citizens who have already gone through the legal process and quite frankly I ask and encourage them to contact the Canadian Firearms Centre to be re-identified.
The
Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair):
The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly
the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m. pursuant to Standing Order
24(1).
(The
House adjourned at 6.37 p.m.)
http://www.parl.gc.ca/37/1/parlbus/chambus/house/debates/165_2002-04-10/HAN165-E.htm#Int-191181