39th Parliament, 1st Session
(April 3, 2006 - )

Edited Hansard • Number 024

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

QUESTIONS

Firearms Registry

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz (Yorkton—Melville, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General has reported on what we have suspected for years. The cost of the gun registry continues to spiral out of control. The Auditor General's 2002 report criticized Liberal spending. At that time the former prime minister said, “We have to make sure it does not happen again. It is simply inexcusable”. However he and his Liberal government continued to fail to keep costs under control.

Could the Minister of Public Safety tell us how the Liberals managed to fail so completely and misspend millions of taxpayer dollars?

Hon. Stockwell Day (Minister of Public Safety, CPC): Mr. Speaker, taking some of the excerpts from Sheila Fraser's report, it reminded me of the many comments made by the member for Yorkton--Melville over the years. He warned about this. Did the Liberals listen?

Ms. Fraser talked about the Liberals going to great lengths to hide the true cost. Did they listen? No. She talked about cost overruns that were incredible. Did they listen? No. She talked about the fact that there were no written records of key meetings. Did they listen? No. She talked about the fact that they used lawyers to deny her key information. Did they listen? No. She talked about the fact that there was a lack of performance standards and that the lack of performance standards put our officers at risk. Did they listen? No.

Are we going to fix the problem? Yes.

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