Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
National Security and Defence
Issue No. 38 - Evidence - Meeting of March 18, 2019
OTTAWA, Monday, March 18, 2019
The Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence, to which was referred Bill C-71, An Act to amend certain Acts and Regulations in relation to firearms, met this day at 11:01 a.m. to give consideration to the bill; and, in camera, to examine and report on Canada’s national security and defence policies, practices, circumstances and capabilities (consideration of a draft report).
Senator Gwen Boniface (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Welcome to the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence.
Colleagues, as you know, it has been a very difficult weekend in New Zealand. On behalf of all committee members, Senator Jaffer will make a statement.
Senator Jaffer: Today, I want to speak to all Muslim brothers and sisters in Canada and around the world.
We may be crippled and crushed by the latest incident in New Zealand. We may feel defeated or weak. I say to all that we will not hide in fear. We will not be destroyed. I kindly ask all Canadians to work with us to fight xenophobia and Islamophobia that so easily take hold and to send a message that all Canadians are equal.
As the first Muslim senator, I can tell all my Muslim brothers and sisters that I certainly have been treated very equally by all my colleagues here. I want you to know that Canadians truly believe we are equal.
The question I am asking is: How can we reconcile our position with the terrible carnage we witnessed from the New Zealand mosque attacks? Honourable senators, allow me to share a quote from Dr. Najma Ahmed of Canadian Doctors for Protection from Guns:
Guns are the vector in this preventable public health crisis. They are the key exposure in this epidemic. Physicians are witnesses to the human toll that guns take on our patients, their families and our communities.
Canadians, when we come together, we are invincible. Let us work together to deal with all sorts of hatred because we are better than that. We are bigger than that.
Chair, thank you for giving me this opportunity.
The Chair: I would ask my colleagues to introduce themselves.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Jean-Guy Dagenais from Quebec.
Senator Boisvenu: Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu from Quebec.
[English]
Senator Richards: David Richards, New Brunswick.
Senator McIntyre: Paul McIntyre, New Brunswick.
Senator Wells: David Wells, Newfoundland and Labrador.
Senator Oh: Victor Oh, Ontario.
Senator McPhedran: Marilou McPhedran, independent senator from Manitoba.
Senator Gold: Marc Gold, Quebec.
[Translation]
Senator Pratte: André Pratte from Quebec.
[English]
Senator Griffin: Diane Griffin, Prince Edward Island.
Senator Jaffer: Mobina Jaffer, British Columbia.
The Chair: I am Gwen Boniface, your chair.
This morning, we continue our study of Bill C-71, an Act to amend certain Acts and Regulations in relation to firearms. Before I move to witnesses, I would like to remind all senators that if they are intending on proposing amendments at clause by clause currently planned for April 8, it is recommended you consult with the Office of the Law Clerk and notify the clerk so that he can be ready on that day.
For our first panel, we have Marc Renaud, President, Fédération québécoise des chasseurs et pêcheurs who is joining us by video conference; Gerald Ingeveld, Director, Alberta Provincial Rural Crime Watch Association; and Ray Orb, President, Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities who is also joining us by video conference. Welcome to all of you.
Mr. Renaud, would you like to begin?
[Translation]
Marc Renaud, President, Fédération québécoise des chasseurs et pêcheurs: Madam Chair, senators and members of the committee, thank you for allowing us to speak to Bill C-71. My name is Marc Renaud. I am President of the Fédération québécoise des chasseurs et pêcheurs, which I will refer to as FédéCP.
I would like to start by pointing out that for more than 45 years our organization has actively contributed to the significant reduction in firearms-related injuries and deaths. We have thus shown that our training and preventative measures are effective. FédéCP is a non-profit that has represented Quebec hunters and fishers for 73 years. We now have 270 member associations and organizations in all regions of Quebec.
FédéCP received a government mandate in 1972 after we made an innovative request to give mandatory courses to anyone who wants to hunt. Since 1994, we have been mandated by Quebec’s Ministry of Public Safety to teach Canadian firearms safety courses. In the past five years, our educational affiliate, Sécurité et nature, has trained more than 250,000 participants, including 100,000 people who have taken the Introduction to Hunting with a Firearm Course. Our position with respect to Bill C-71 is found in the brief submitted by the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters (OFAH). This position is shared by 10 other Canadian federations of hunters and anglers named in the OFAH brief, which is attached.
Today, FédéCP is appearing before this committee as the representative of hunters and anglers and firearms safety training experts. I would like to start by stating that although FédéCP supports having a better firearms framework in order to ensure public safety, we do not support Bill C-71, which represents another set of measures that will affect law-abiding gun owners.
Given that we have first-hand experience with a federal registry and a provincial registration system, we are aware of the technical difficulties that can arise when enforcing laws that have a very broad objective and create more red tape for the state and law-abiding citizens without reaching its objective. If the bill really seeks to improve Canadians’ safety, significant amendments will have to be made to Bill C-71 in order to target the real perpetrators of gun violence. If we consider each element of the bill, we note that many clarifications are necessary. The time limit for the background check for a possession and acquisition licence, which is no longer five years, must be defined. Furthermore, can an individual who has committed an offence take steps to be rehabilitated and obtain a licence? When it comes to selling a firearm, it will again be up to the seller to be conscientious and to do the verification. By providing a single tool for validating the licence, the seller is protected, but we must ensure that the verification process is simple, very efficient and accessible at all times.
The provisions governing retailers’ transaction records, which must be kept for 20 years, must be enhanced. Buyers must be assured that their personal information is kept secure and can only be accessed for the purpose of criminal investigations and with judicial authorization. With respect to the classification of firearms, we believe it is much more important to know how firearms are classified than who is classifying them. We believe that the classification process should be standardized in consultation with firearm users, who should also have access to an appeal system. The grandfathering provision for owners of firearms that will be prohibited is very important to our members who own firearms used for hunting that could soon be in this category.
FédéCP represents firearms owners who are trained to use and store their firearms securely. We are the first to promote public safety through public awareness campaigns and training. However, we are disappointed with this bill which, once again, increases red tape for honest citizens without considering the reality of gun owners and, above all, without achieving the main objective that concerns us all, ensuring public safety.
We hope that this bill will be amended and that it will be accompanied by real measures to target criminal elements and tackle gun violence. Thank you for your attention. We invite you to refer to the OFAH brief, which is available on its website, for a detailed explanation of our proposed amendments. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you.
[English]
Gerald Ingeveld, Director, Alberta Provincial Rural Crime Watch Association: Indeed it is an honour to be in Ottawa addressing you in this place and representing the board of the Alberta Provincial Rural Crime Watch Association. Our association is made up of approximately 17,000 individuals within 53 member groups province wide. Our focus, in cooperation with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, is to promote crime prevention through awareness, education and encouraging the reporting of suspicious activity when observed.
The Rural Crime Watch program was designed to reduce the incidence of crime in all rural areas and to create a more thorough understanding and awareness of the laws. It is completely voluntary, involving rural residents working in cooperation with their local RCMP detachments.
Rural crime has been on the rise in Alberta over the past decade. Our work has become more intense, introducing rural residents to ways and means of crime proofing their residences and vehicles as much as possible. Still it seems at times a losing battle. It is hard to express the feeling of violation when your home and property have been entered and robbed.
Bill C-71 has been captioned as a crime fighting strategy. As much as we can agree that no single strategy but a series of strategies needs to be employed to the problem of rural crime, I question the value of this one. From what I see, there are three goals here: to change the status of some weapons from unrestricted to restricted, to add regulations to the movement of registered handguns, and to add a registrar who will verify if the ownership of an unrestricted weapon can be transferred from one person to another.
Most rural crime is property crime and some of the perpetrators are armed. These weapons are seldom purchased through any legitimate transactions but are usually stolen. How the weapon should have been registered, how it was transported and whether a registrar is patiently waiting in an office for a request to transfer a firearm is of little interest to these people.
I would invite our legislators to calculate the dollar cost of the initiatives of Bill C-71 and then consider that midway through 2018, K Division fully implemented what had previously been a pilot program called the RCMP Crime Reduction Strategy. For an estimated additional annual cost of $10 million, they created special crime reduction units throughout the province to reduce crime through crime prevention, targeting habitual and prolific offenders, identifying crime hot spots through locally informed intelligence led policing, identifying the root causes of crime and offering alternate life choices. In the first six months of this program, rural crime has been reduced in all categories by roughly 10 per cent.
To me, this approach to a problem best exemplifies how the people, like my father and grandfather, approached problems and how I believe Canadians used to approach problems.
As I mentioned when I began, it is an honour to be here in Ottawa. This capital city represents over 150 years of freedom and opportunity. My grandfather came to Canada in 1905 seeking that freedom and opportunity. Then he returned to Europe to serve in the First World War. My father also served in Europe from 1939 to 1945.
Why did these men who were safe here in Canada risk it all to go to Europe and fight wars that left them alive but broken? It was because they believed that safety does not trump freedom, that when there is a problem you don’t sit back and create another rule or regulation; you roll up your sleeves, you go in and you fix the problem. This is how I was raised. Rural crime isn’t someone else’s problem. Certainly someone else isn’t going to fix it for me, and certainly not with more regulations.
That is why I support Rural Crime Watch and the work of the RCMP. If there is money available to create more positions to regulate firearms, please provide, instead, the RCMP and Rural Crime Watch organizations with additional on the ground resources to deal with the crime. We are beginning to see results.
Ray Orb, President, Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities: The Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities, known as SARM, was incorporated in 1905 and has been the voice of rural Saskatchewan for over 100 years. We represent all 296 rural municipalities that make up our province. We cover 53 per cent of the province’s total land mass and our rural municipalities encase virtually all of the agricultural land. Our most populated rural municipality serves just over 8,000 rural residents while our smallest serves 76. We are vast and we are diverse. Our role is to serve our members and champion the value of rural Saskatchewan.
Naturally, we appreciate this opportunity to speak to the firearms issue. Bill C-71 will impact farmers and ranchers. We are concerned that the bill does not reflect the needs of rural residents.
Saskatchewan was ignored in the drafting of this legislation. We were not heard during Minister Blair’s national consultations on tackling gun crime. Because Saskatchewan is a rural province, there are legitimate concerns related to gun ownership and rural crime that need to be reflected in any new government legislation or policy. We believe this legislation is directed toward urban centres like Toronto and Vancouver, where issues with gun crime have captured national attention.
Unfortunately, there are unintended impacts on rural areas. We understand that the City of Toronto has been a major proponent of banning hand guns. However, the president of the Toronto Police Association recently stated that a handgun ban would have no impact on the people who intend to use a gun to shoot someone. We agree with that. Prohibiting firearms will only impact law-abiding and responsible gun owners, many of whom have responsibly owned firearms for decades.
Rural municipalities in Saskatchewan have long voiced the need for the federal government to get tougher on crime, but we do not believe the proposal to ban handguns is the way to do it. Rural land owners need firearms to protect their farms and their livestock, which is their livelihood, from predators and pests. We believe that farmers and rural residents need to be asked directly about the necessity of firearms in rural areas.
Unfortunately, round tables were only held in Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and Moncton. There were no round tables scheduled in Saskatchewan. We believe more need to be held so that Canadians across the country have an opportunity to share their perspectives.
Over the last several years, SARM members have not raised any concerns with the existing legislation regarding firearms. However, rural residents are concerned about firearm bans or confiscation of private property.
We also oppose the return of a long-gun registry in any form. For instance, to use reference numbers for transactions creates a form of gun registry as one would be able to look up the information on a firearm vis-à-vis the reference number.
The timeliness to issue permits and authorizations for transporting firearms are also a concern. It is important that the Government of Canada ensures that federal staff have the capacity to handle all incoming phone calls and inquiries in an expeditious manner with a high level of service.
SARM opposes a handgun ban as it would not be effective in preventing crime but would significantly impact responsible law-abiding gun owners.
SARM has made tremendous strides in working with the RCMP on crime prevention. As part of the recommendation from the Saskatchewan Caucus Committee on Crime, the province created a Protection and Response Team known as the PRT. The PRT expands on the success of blending policing models to improve emergency response services, to increase uniform visibility and to enhance safety on Saskatchewan roads.
SARM is also a supporter of Crime Stoppers and we participate on the Saskatchewan Crime Stoppers board of directors. We’ve also worked hard to reinvigorate the Rural Crime Watch program and have seen tremendous uptake in this program.
We have also recently headed up a provincial crime watch association to serve as an umbrella association to provide support to local groups. Just last week, we made an announcement of the new Saskatchewan Crime Watch Advisory Network.
The new advisory is a mass notification system that will allow rural residents to sign up for notifications of criminal activity occurring in their area so they can keep watch and report back on suspicious activity. We are hopeful that all these things I’ve mentioned will add to the basket of tools and peace of mind for our rural residents.
As you can tell, rural crime prevention is a key concern for SARM. We are working diligently in this area. We do not believe that banning handguns will be an effective measure in reducing crime. We believe our voice should be heard and request that a round table be held on the Prairies so that the concerns of farmers can be heard firsthand.
On behalf of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities, we thank the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence for the opportunity to lend our voice to this important conversation.
The Chair: We have a number of people on the list.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: My first question is for Mr. Renaud. During your presentation, you indicated that you would like Bill C-71 to be amended. Could you give us some examples of amendments to the bill that you would like to see?
We are meeting with the Minister of Public Safety, Mr. Ralph Goodale, today, and he will surely like to know what those amendments might be.
Mr. Renaud: As I already mentioned, record-keeping and background checks are still the responsibility of law-abiding citizens. I would suggest that the bill include clearer, better defined and more specific measures to move forward on this. We are also concerned about the return of a gun registry. We already know how that turned out.
To summarize, the amendments should better target the criminal elements. Right now, this is about bureaucracy, and nothing is being done on the ground to reduce crime because criminals don’t need controlled guns.
Senator Dagenais: My second question is for Mr. Ingeveld. As Mr. Renaud just mentioned, urban and rural areas have a different perspective on this bill. In urban areas, street gangs use unregistered firearms, which are often purchased on the black market. We recognize that supporters of a gun registry tend to be urban dwellers, who do not understand the realities of rural life. Do you believe that the bill should take into account the differences between urban and rural areas?
[English]
Mr. Ingeveld: It’s very difficult for me to caption the difference between rural and urban. If you have never lived rural and made your living there, it is difficult to understand the differences. As for me, I raise cattle. There are times when an animal is in distress and needs to be euthanized immediately. Rather than waiting two or three hours for a veterinarian to come out and inject them with some chemicals, they have to be taken care of right away.
I am also within a half mile of a corridor where wildlife travel. I have bears, wolves, cougars and all those wonderful things, so there is the idea protection. Perhaps the biggest piece of protection is from those who are actually coming from urban areas to rob rural areas. That’s where most of the perpetrators are coming from. They are coming out from the city in a stolen vehicle to rob from rural residents.
The difference in crime is that these people that are not in a group and looking for someone to steal from. These are people that are doing surveillance on your property. They are watching your comings and goings, and then they are moving in. They are often moving in to steal with a shopping list. It’s organized in that through devices they are finding out that there is a need for car tires, electric drills and televisions. They go in and steal those specific things.
It is very different from the rural to urban. Possibly the biggest difference is that I am only 11 kilometres from the local RCMP detachment, but it takes over 20 minutes for the RCMP to respond if an officer happens to be in the office and not 50 or 60 kilometres away from my residence. Our detachment area is huge. It’s about 150 kilometres across. When something is wrong in my community, the RCMP is wonderful for investigating and for trying to recover property, but when responding to what could be a frightening situation it’s rather slow.
Senator Jaffer: Mr. Ingeveld, I understand that you work closely with the RCMP. The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police are supporting this bill. They say it will help with their investigative work. Superintendent Gordon Sneddon said:
It’s really important from a policing and investigative perspective to be able to trace that firearm. I can’t stress that enough.
Do you agree with that statement?
Mr. Ingeveld: I don’t agree with the statement. This is more anecdotal. This is what I know from the area I work in as a director in a particular area. The firearms confiscated typically from an arrest where property is recovered have been stolen, obviously.
The first thing a person does when they steal a firearm is take a grinder to the serial number and completely remove it. In most cases, that’s the only way to track a firearm. I own a firearm that belonged to my grandfather. It was built in 1921 and has a pretty weird little serial number on it. It’s barely there just from storing it. The serial numbers are removed and then they are altered. The barrels and stocks are cut off so they can easily conceal them. They are immediately illegal as soon as they are adjusted like that.
Second, I really don’t understand how the RCMP can say they can better trace firearms when the serial numbers are immediately removed. Again, I am not a policeman.
Senator Jaffer: Mr. Orb, some witnesses that have appeared before us have said the recent increase in gun homicides is due to organized crime and gangs alone. These homicides involve handguns which are already prohibited and not long guns. Therefore they feel that Bill C-71 is attacking law-abiding Canadians, but Statistics Canada data show that non-gang related murders still account for about half of all firearm homicides in Canada’s rural areas.
I have had a number of calls from women in rural areas saying they need protection, especially around domestic violence. Have you seen links between gun violence and domestic violence in rural Saskatchewan?
Mr. Orb: Unfortunately I don’t have the statistics to back up any answer that I make. I understand there could be a link. However, you have to understand how many farmers and ranchers are in remote rural areas. There aren’t many people living around them. People often feel threatened. They need to have firearms for the protection of their livestock and farms, whether they be handguns or long-gun rifles. We are fortunate that we have the RCMP.
As I mentioned, we have increased the amount of crime watch in the area. We know there are gangs in areas around the entire province of Saskatchewan. My sense is that gangs in rural areas are not as prevalent out on the farms, but the crime related to gangs in the area is a real issue.
Senator Jaffer: Do you have statistics in another place, or is it just that you do not have statistics?
Mr. Orb: I don’t have the statistics to support Saskatchewan.
Senator Gold: Good day and thank you for being here to all of our guests.
[Translation]
I’m going to start with a question for Mr. Renaud. The Fédération québécoise des chasseurs et pêcheurs is recognized for its efforts with respect to education and safety. Kudos to you and your members.
I don’t have your exact words, but you talked about the red tape that you think is part of Bill C-71. Can you explain the difficulties and the red tape that hunters in Quebec will be subjected to if the bill is passed? For example, background checks will not make a difference to the vast majority of those who have done nothing wrong. Changes in the authorization to transport will not affect your members. The changes to licence verification and record-keeping will change nothing for hunters. I find it difficult to understand your point of view. Perhaps you could explain these difficulties for us.
Mr. Renaud: Thank you for acknowledging that our federation does good work in educating and raising awareness.
This is the red tape that hunters have to deal with. If we are talking about background checks for buying firearms, there is no real way to help buyers in this process if their transaction is done on evenings or weekends. If we are talking about transporting restricted weapons, the effects are minimal, but how does that improve public safety?
Our experience with the Canadian Firearms Registry at the federal and provincial levels showed us that every time measures are added, it is just more bureaucracy for the government machine. This is more money that could be used for something else. Hunters are already doing everything they’re supposed to. They have all the means and obligations they need. The background checks you’re talking about are just an added burden.
Bill C-71 needs to be fixed if you want it to achieve the right objectives and make sure all this bureaucracy doesn’t hurt hunters and that the money is used to focus on the criminal aspect of this issue.
Senator Gold: Thank you.
[English]
Perhaps I could ask a second question. Two of our guests today spoke about the problem of crime in rural areas and distinguished it from problems in urban areas.
The bill attacks not only the issue of crime but also the damage, homicides and injuries caused by firearms more generally. In that regard, according to Statistics Canada, non-gang related murders still account for about half of firearm homicides in Canada’s rural areas. In rural areas, non-gang related homicides account for about 80 per cent of homicides by firearm, very often with long guns.
In Saskatchewan, the rate is much higher than the national average. Whether it’s domestic violence or the like, could you comment on why you think Bill C-71 doesn’t attack a real problem, admittedly not the street gang problem in downtown Toronto but a problem that is costing lives and damaging lives on a regular and growing basis?
Mr. Ingeveld: When I talk about gun crime we have to keep in mind that I’ve been raised with firearms. They are something that my family has always had to have. We’re third-generation ranchers in a rural community. As I mentioned, both my father and grandfather were servicemen. We were trained on the safe handling of firearms.
If we decided that we wanted to do someone harm, we also know that we could do so in many ways. We’ve heard of cases of people driving their vehicles onto sidewalks and harming people. I’ve studied martial arts. I can harm people with my hands. Fertilizer and diesel fuel will make a pretty significant bomb.
Those of us making our living in rural communities see firearms as tools that we need. Many tools can be used for violent and despicable acts. Vehicles are licensed very carefully yet many people die because of people who use vehicles recklessly.
We believe that stronger registration activities for firearms will not make people less violent. We need to find a way to dig out why these people are violent. Why are they stealing? Is it drugs? Is it desperation? What is causing them to do this? Then let’s see if we can find a way to redirect their lives so that they carry out fewer violent acts.
Even a gun registration is not a terrible thing. It won’t cause me to be terribly upset. It’s just another inconvenience that we feel will not help the root cause of the situation. That’s why we would rather see resources put toward discovering and dealing with those root causes rather than bringing in another regulation.
The Chair: Mr. Orb, do you have anything to add?
Mr. Orb: Yes, I would say that in our province the RCMP does most of the investigations and looks after the rural crime issues. A lot of the issues are because there are criminals out there who need money, whether it be for drugs or whether they just need money to use for their own families. The jobless rates in our province have gone up, particularly as a result of the drop in the economy in the oil sector.
We know many people out there are trying to confiscate property by stealing. They know if they break into a house that there are firearms there. The firearms are registered, but these are criminals. If they take the firearms, the RCMP tries to apprehend them and in many cases they do.
Because farmers and ranchers already have their guns registered, we don’t know why we have to go further. There are laws in place already. We don’t hear our rural members saying that we need tighter gun control. We need better education. There needs to be education on the safe storage of firearms to make sure people know where to keep registered firearms and how to store them. Surveillance is very important when people are out there trying to break into farm homes and ranch properties.
More stringent regulation will not help. In some cases it might actually make it worse for legal gun owners.
Senator McPhedran: I want to begin by acknowledging and thanking Senator Jaffer for reminding us of the severity of the use of guns and by pointing out that the guns, as far as we know, for the massacre that took place most recently in New Zealand are available and can be modified in Canada.
I have a question to all three panellists. Do you own cars and did you purchase those cars yourselves?
Mr. Ingeveld: Yes.
Mr. Orb: Yes.
Senator McPhedran: Mr. Renaud?
[Translation]
Mr. Renaud: Yes.
[English]
Senator McPhedran: The second part of my question is this: Are all three of you aware, since you are the purchasers, of the registration process for cars in your respective provinces, the keeping of records of those who sell the cars and if you transfer ownership? Have you ever objected to the registration process sellers and buyers of cars must comply with?
Mr. Ingeveld: No, I have not.
Mr. Orb: No, not recently. I haven’t.
Senator McPhedran: But you have at some point.
Mr. Orb: I live out in a rural area, sometimes we don’t have good access to high-speed Internet. Therefore, filling out forms or downloading forms sometimes takes a long time.
[Translation]
Mr. Renaud: I’ve never had any problem, but we’re not talking about the same behaviour or the same interests.
[English]
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
My next question is again for all three gentlemen. How many women members do you have in your respective organizations?
Mr. Ingeveld: We have just about exactly 50 per cent. In our organization for the most part we register our members as family units.
Mr. Orb: Our rural councillors and reeves are all elected officials. Probably about 20 per cent of them are women. However, on our board of directors we have almost gender equity. We have almost half.
[Translation]
Mr. Renaud: I couldn’t say exactly what percentage of our members are women, but it must be around 30 to 40 per cent. More and more women are taking a firearms safety course and are hunting enthusiasts. Two out of 14 members of our provincial board are women. Most of our employees are women; only three out of 16 employees are men.
[English]
Senator McPhedran: My last question is for you, Mr. Ingeveld, because you made reference to the RCMP. Do you have any concerns about the level of expertise that the RCMP has demonstrated in your dealings with them in terms of understanding and dealing with firearms?
Mr. Ingeveld: There are a lot of people in the RCMP. We have members that are transferred around to areas. Sometimes we have someone who is urban raised and comes out to a rural area. There is a bit of getting used to what rural means. For the most part we find those who deal with our association in my area to be very well versed in the handling of firearms.
However, I believe they are trained on the particular firearms they get to use. Their expertise would be more in what they’ve been trained on rather than some different or unique models of firearms. For the most part, I am well pleased.
Senator Pratte: I have one question for all three of our witnesses.
[Translation]
Let me begin, Mr. Renaud, by commending you on the prevention and education work the federation does. I took one of those courses and I can attest to the fact that they are very well done and very well organized.
[English]
All three of you have mentioned that you’re concerned that the bill is introducing some form of new long-gun registry, whether it is a back-door registry or indirect registry. I would like to know where exactly you get that idea from. First it’s clear in the bill that:
. . . nothing in this Act shall be construed so as to permit or require the registration of non-restricted firearms.
It’s in the bill. That amendment was brought forward in the House of Commons committee and was adopted unanimously.
Second, the system to verify the validity of the PAL reference number is not linked to any description of the firearm. That’s the way the bill is. There is no way you can link both.
If there is no registration and the owners don’t have to carry a registration form or whatever, where does the idea come from that this is somehow a registry?
Mr. Ingeveld: I read in the bill that there would be an office of a registrar. I have no idea what you would use a registrar for if you have no registry.
Senator Pratte: With respect, sir, the position of registrar already exists. It’s there already and it’s the Chief Firearms Officer.
Mr. Orb: I would say there is a suspicion among our members that we’re looking at another form of long-gun registry. We know some vendors are already tracking. They are already doing that, and we’re not in favour of that. We don’t think we should have another gun registry when the government, not many years ago, got rid of that.
Whenever the government has access to information, that information will be kept and it could be used. That’s our suspicion. If you’re saying the bill guarantees that won’t happen, we will hold the government to that. We want to make sure that doesn’t happen.
[Translation]
Mr. Renaud: Let me tell you what worries us. As you know, in Quebec we inherited a gun registry. After the federal government invested so much money and ultimately abolished the registry, we’re concerned that a lot more money is going to be invested yet again to the detriment of the public and on the backs of hunters because of certain restrictions or certain changes. We believe that money should be used to achieve the desired effect of the bill, to enhance safety, instead of being used to add more red tape. This bill is supposed to address gun-related crime, but we’re not seeing that at all.
As the two other witnesses said, our fear is that we are going to end up with another registry that cost exorbitant amounts of money and has no place. Has the data really been erased from the registry? In Quebec, the data is still available. Was it really erased in the other provinces? We wonder about that.
Senator Pratte: I understand your concerns, but to me the bill is very clear. These concerns may be legitimate, but they are not justified by the wording of the bill.
[English]
The Chair: As a reminder to senators, we have about 12 minutes left and five senators looking to ask questions.
[Translation]
Senator McIntyre: My question is for Mr. Renaud. Our study today is on stricter gun control for restricted and prohibited firearms. I would like your thoughts on improving control over this category of firearms. To your knowledge, is control over the transportation and use of this category of firearm strict enough? If so, why?
Mr. Renaud: First, we argue that it is strict enough. According to the bill, very few users transport to different locations. A look at the OFAH document, which elaborates on this topic quite well, will give you a better understanding of the issue.
[English]
Senator McIntyre: My next question is for all three of you. As you know, sections 34 and 35 of the Criminal Code govern defence of person and defence of property respectively. In determining whether the act committed is reasonable in the circumstances, the court must consider the relevant circumstances of the person, the other parties and the act, including but not limited to several factors.
Ultimately, my understanding is that most cases come down to reasonableness and proportionality. To some extent one is permitted to stand his ground, but it depends, once again, on the question of reasonableness and proportionality.
Are you satisfied with the wording of the provisions, or should the provisions be strengthened to avoid any confusion?
Mr. Ingeveld: We’ve had two cases in Alberta in the last 12 months where people armed with illegal, modified firearms arrived on properties. In those two cases, the owners of the properties believed that their lives were threatened. They fired their weapons and injured two people.
The issue of reasonable force was brought up and tried. In the first case it was believed that it was not reasonable force because the assailant had not fired. I am not a lawyer. This might sound silly, how I am saying it. Because the person defending himself had the opportunity to run away and not stand his ground, that’s what he should have done. In the second case it was felt that he did not intend to actually shoot the person, that a warning shot had ricochetted.
In both cases there was little opportunity to stand your ground. That sort of interpretation doesn’t seem to be in favour of the property owner.
Senator McIntyre: Would anyone else care to comment?
Mr. Orb: As part of the Criminal Code, we’re somewhat familiar with the inference to self-defence. We know that part of it refers to what is reasonable. We’ve had several cases in Saskatchewan where the assailants were actually armed and ready to use their firearms. In some cases they did use their firearms. I know of a few cases where the landowners retaliated and fired back to try to protect their families.
This would have been done in a home. It wouldn’t have been done outside of a home. When you talk about standing your ground, the implication for me is that you have nowhere to go if you’re a homeowner. You’re trying to protect your family. To use a firearm would be a last resort. It would be only if they were fearful for their own lives or the lives of their families.
Our members have asked us to look at this part of the Criminal Code to see if it could be changed, but there is no appetite from the federal government and no appetite from our provincial justice minister either. It’s very important for people to understand and we’ve tried to educate our members on that.
Senator Griffin: I had two questions but Senator Dagenais has already taken one of them. My second question is for the first witness, Mr. Renaud.
You referenced the national gun registry and your fear that it could come back again. When the former national gun registry was in place, did it have any impact on the statistics related to crimes that are committed? Do you know that? Did it have any impact on the crime level?
[Translation]
Mr. Renaud: Unfortunately, I don’t have that data. However, we believe that the registry did not contribute to lowering the crime rate.
Through the years, we see that awareness of carrying firearms quietly contributes to lowering the crime rate even without the firearms registry.
[English]
Senator Griffin: That answers my question. The obvious difference was negligible compared with other resources such as education, which is the same as our witness from Alberta is saying in that resources for education of firearms owners or prospective firearms owners seems to be exceedingly important. Thank you.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Thank you to our guests. First, Mr. Renaud, thank you for your testimony. I commend you on the awareness work you do with the hunters, fishers, and trappers in Quebec.
Have you been consulted by the department on this bill?
Mr. Renaud: Not as such, but the Ontario federation, which is the standard-bearer of the other federations, was directly consulted and we supported its initiative.
Senator Boisvenu: Have you expressed your opposition to this bill, in part or entirely?
Mr. Renaud: As I said, we are against Bill C-71. If this bill sees the light of day, we recommend that some changes be made to ensure a better understanding and better accessibility, without easing restrictions.
Senator Boisvenu: Were the recommended changes forwarded to the department during the consultation?
Mr. Renaud: I couldn’t say.
Senator Boisvenu: As far as the hunters’ backgrounds are concerned, I’m sure you’re referring to mental health history and history of domestic violence?
Mr. Renaud: Under the bill, the vendor or purchaser is responsible for the background check. They determine by what means the possession licence will be verified. It is simple, but it has to go further. It is incumbent on the vendor to assume this responsibility.
Senator Boisvenu: You say that these background checks need to be clarified. Can you explain what type of clarifications should be made in the bill?
Mr. Renaud: You tell us. Nothing is defined and we want to know what to do about that. We could take part in consultations if necessary to establish a process together. The process is not known. It is not defined. We want that to be clear before the bill is passed.
Senator Boisvenu: Thank you very much.
[English]
Senator Oh: Most of my questions have been answered. I just see Bill C-71 as focusing too much on legal gun owners, hunters and people with proper licences.
I think Bill C-71 should be focused more on the person behind the gun. A gun doesn’t go around shooting at anyone. When I saw the clips on the weekend, the cartridges were uploaded three or four times.
I think this bill should be focusing more on tougher punishment for the person behind the gun. Could you comment on that, please?
Mr. Ingeveld: I don’t really have an opinion on the word “punishment.” I do have an opinion on finding the root cause and eliminating it. We know a lot of it has to do with drugs and the need for cash for that. I suppose some have to do with our economy not doing so well, but for most of the people who are picked up and have been committing these crimes in rural areas, a lot of it is drug and lifestyle related. We could go after the root causes of those and catch them early.
Again, why is it that the people who are being picked up are often committing their third, fourth, fifth or fifteenth offences? Somewhere along the line between, let’s say, the twelfth and fourteenth offence, maybe something can intercede in that lifestyle earlier. Rather than stronger punishment, let’s try to divert those energies into something that can prevent. Prevention is worth a lot more than attempting a cure.
The Chair: Mr. Renaud or Mr. Orb, do you have anything to add?
Mr. Renaud: No.
Mr. Orb: We believe there should be more of a deterrent. The gentleman from Alberta is right in that many of these perpetrators have long criminal records and they are not being punished enough.
However we are taking the other approach. We are trying to do better surveillance on ranches and farms, trying to be able to follow and share information with the RCMP to deter criminals and to prevent crime in a lot of cases. We think that funding from the federal government to the provinces will do more to deter crime than anything else.
Senator Richards: I am a rural Canadian. I own guns. I have a 1913 .22. I have hunted since I was 14. I took that course you do when you are a kid. Four months ago, when a guy who was strung out on meth broke into my house, the last thing I thought of was guns. I grabbed ahold of him and put him out of my house. I didn’t think of getting a gun to use. I am not saying others wouldn’t; I am just saying I never did.
My difficulty with this bill is that I think it’s a subtle, bureaucratic way of profiling rural Canadians. That’s how I feel about it. Nothing that has been said has convinced me otherwise. Can any of you comment on that just briefly?
Mr. Ingeveld: Sure, I’ll dive in there. I am extremely, extremely proud to be a rural Canadian. I am very proud of my background. My grandfather came here with the intention of being a rural Canadian. That’s all I’ve ever been.
If someone wants to profile me as being a certain way, bring it on. I am very comfortable in who we are. If someone wants to say that women in rural areas are somehow afraid, I would like you to meet my wife and some of the women who live in our rural areas. They are salt of the earth people; they are solid people. They typically don’t have a lot of use for bureaucracy. They are much more for getting down and getting at it. My wife was born in Saskatchewan, so that probably has a lot to do with it as well.
I don’t think anyone is intentionally trying to put us down. We may feel that way, but rural Canadians are very proud of being rural Canadians.
Senator Richards: That is what I am saying, actually. I am proud to be a rural Canadian as well, but sometimes I think the bureaucracy oversteps its bound in that regard. That’s what I am trying to say.
The Chair: We will take this opportunity to thank our witnesses for being here. We really appreciate the time you have taken and the contribution you have made to the committee.
For our second panel, we welcome Lise Martin, Executive Director, Women’s Shelters Canada; as an individual, Brian Mishara, Professor, Department of Psychology, Université du Québec in Montréal; and Amanda Dale, Executive Director, Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic.
Amanda Dale, Executive Director, Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic: Our clinic in Toronto is Canada’s only gender-based violence clinic that provides legal counselling and language interpretation support for victims of gender-based violence. Last year we served about 9,000 women.
I heard from the previous speakers that there is some currency in having rural roots. I want the committee to know that my father had a farm and that he was accustomed to shooting groundhogs from the front door. I am aware of the use of guns in rural settings. I am here to urge you to adopt the modest efforts to restore a balance in the approach to tools that have no other purpose but to kill — that is guns — and the right to privacy.
I remind the committee that the legislation under discussion begins with a chapeau clause prohibiting anything in the act to permit or require a registry. The legislation has two short but crucial sections on extending the criteria for licensing, to which I will speak briefly, while three pages are fully devoted to grandfathering in existing gun owners and spelling out their entitlements based on possession, not licensing.
In the course of reading this legislation we see the removal of the five-year period applying to the eligibility for holding a licence. We see that any form of violence against any person is a prohibition and a criterion to be considered for exclusion of licensing. We can see that the transfer of a non-restrictive firearm will have the licence of the transferee verified by the Registrar of Firearms.
Overall, the legislation is clearly shaped by a narrative of gun rights over that of human rights or a feminist perspective, for instance. It is an important step in restoring some basic controls to ensure that those who suffer most from the guns that are licensed — that being women and those with mental health issues — have some means to protect themselves.
I will leave some time for the committee to ask questions and to probe deeper. Thank you.
Lise Martin, Executive Director, Women’s Shelters Canada: Women’s Shelters Canada is a national, non-profit network representing violence against women shelters and transition houses.
According to the most recent report of the Canadian Femicide Observatory, 148 women were killed in Canada in 2018. The most common method used when a woman or girl was killed was shooting. We know that most of the women killed with guns in Canada were killed with legally owned rifles and shotguns.
The most recent 2017 Statistics Canada homicide report found that the national increase in homicides committed with a firearm was evident in rural areas. This increase is largely attributable to gun violence in the rural areas of the Prairie provinces. Intimate partner violence rates among the provinces were highest in Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
As a national network, part of our work includes understanding the unique regional contexts where VAW shelters are located, including rural, remote and northern areas. In our conversations with rural VAW shelters, we have heard that rural women are fearful for their lives and their safety in their homes where firearms are present, that firearms are often not safely stored or locked away, and that they impact women’s ability to seek help and supports to flee domestic violence.
The realities were documented in a study conducted by the University of New Brunswick Department of Sociology. The study revealed that 25 per cent of women surveyed lived in a household with firearms, 72 per cent of which were long guns. Two-thirds of the women with firearms in their homes said knowing firearms were present made them more fearful for their safety and well-being, and 70 per cent said it affected their decisions whether to tell others or seek help for the abuse they received.
Firearms cause harm to Canadian women in ways other than by death and injury. Alberta shelters remember far too well a tragic incident whereby a little boy was sobbing, “Daddy is going to kill me,” clutching the door jamb of the women’s shelter crying that he didn’t want to go with the dad on a court ordered visit. The father loaded the gun in front of him, took him back to his mother at the end of the visit, shot little Alex, then his mother and then himself. The police had received numerous complaints from the family that the father had guns but nothing was done.
Despite the fact that this case occurred some time ago, the shelter workers remain haunted by it. How many times must this play out across the country? Hundreds of innocent women and children are murdered.
Our Alberta member, the Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters, has been tracking the percentage of women facing severe or extreme levels of danger according to their danger assessment. The danger assessment measures the risk of a woman being murdered by her intimate partner. This percentage has been steadily increasing over the past seven years from 54 per cent in 2011-12 to 64.8 per cent in 2017-18. Today, almost two-thirds of the women in Alberta who complete the danger assessment are in this category. Among other factors, this means increased numbers of women are being threatened with a gun or subjected to strangulation.
In Women’s Shelters Canada’s annual survey we ask shelters to report data on a specific 24-hour period. One of the questions is: To your knowledge how many women currently residing at the shelter have been threatened by a gun? Since the survey began five years ago, the average number of shelters that have responded is 230, and the average number of women staying at the shelter on that day who had been threatened by a gun is 100. The link between guns and violence against women is clear, as is the link between guns and the instance of lethality for victims of domestic violence.
It is for these reasons we strongly believe Bill C-71 is an important first step forward in reducing violence against women and children who are victims of femicide in Canada. Strong licensing provisions are critical to reducing violence against women. Although some may believe that enhanced background checks will not improve public safety, this is not the experience of shelters across the country. There is significant evidence to contradict this position. Prior violence and crime is a strong predictor of future violence. Enhancing the background checks involved in obtaining a licence is a well accepted method of reducing gun crime.
The issue of violence against women is complex, as are the mechanisms and tools to reduce it and eventually bring it to an end. The adoption of Bill C-71, however, is an important step. Preventing and reducing the rates of violence against women will only happen through incremental change, and the adoption of Bill C-71 is one piece of this incremental change.
Finally, we support the recommendations of the Coalition for Gun Control to this committee that call for the restoration of strict authorizations to transport and that the clause extending the authorization to transport through the province in which the owner resides be strengthened. Thank you.
Brian Mishara, Professor, Department of Psychology, Université du Québec à Montréal, as an individual: I am a psychology professor, researcher and Director of the Centre for Research and Intervention on Suicide, Ethical Issues and End-of-Life Practices and a past president of both the Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention and the International Association for Suicide Prevention. I currently work with the World Health Organization in the development of recommendations for evidence-based practices in suicide prevention.
Some 77 per cent of firearms deaths are suicides. Firearms are used in 16 per cent of suicide deaths in Canada. In the area of suicide prevention there are many controversial issues. One issue that is not controversial, so much so that it was one of the primary recommendations of the World Health Organization in 2014 to countries around the world, is that restricting, delaying or making it more difficult to access means for suicide even for short periods of time effectively prevent deaths by suicide.
There is a lot of research on different means including putting up fences or barriers on bridges or so-called hot spots, controlling the quantity of things like Tylenol available in packages on sale and putting up gates in subways.
When some people do not have immediate access to a means, it is true they will use another means, but at least 28 per cent of people in suicidal crises that do not have immediate access or access within a certain period of time to a means they prefer do not use another method of suicide.
Why is this? This is because suicides occur in a crisis situation. The idea to kill one’s self often occurs within minutes or hours, and 50 per cent of the time within 10 minutes between the first thought and the action. Also, if there is substitution, a firearm is a very lethal method. Some 83 per cent of people who use firearms die as compared to 61 per cent of people who use hanging and only 28 per cent or less of people who use self-poisoning.
One of the characteristics of suicide is ambivalence. Deciding to kill one’s self is not a yes or no. There is always quite a bit of ambivalence. There are between 25 and 100 suicide attempts for each death by suicide. The reason there were so many attempts for each death is that the vast majority of suicidal people change their minds after they initiate an attempt. Obviously, if your method is shooting yourself, the chances of your changing your mind and getting medical help are much less than if you take some pills or cut yourself.
There is quite a lot of research. Basically, if you compare the United States, the U.S. states with more restrictive laws have fewer suicides as well as fewer suicides by firearms. When legislation to restrict access in the U.K. was adopted, there were fewer gun suicides and the overall suicide rate went down proportionally. There is similar research from New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland and Austria.
A waiting period, universal background checks, gun locks and open carry regulations have each contributed to fewer suicides. A substantial number of studies reviewed by Anestis in 2017 show no indications of increases in other methods of suicide.
If a gun is present in a home, it is at least six times more likely that someone will die in that home by suicide. This is not because people with guns have more psychiatric disorders such as depression or substance abuse. In the U.S., some states made more restrictive legislation. Other states have changed their legislation and made it less restrictive. For example, Connecticut made more restrictive legislation and had a 15.4 per cent decrease in suicides overall and in firearms suicides. Immediately after Missouri repealed their gun legislation the suicide rate went up by 16.1 per cent.
Anything you can do to restrict, delay or make it more difficult for people who are vulnerable and suicidal to have access to guns will certainly save lives.
The Chair: I remind members that the minister will be here sharply at one o’clock.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: My first question is for Ms. Martin. Currently a gun owner with a permit can carry their restricted weapon to engage in activities that are clearly stated in the act. For example, they can bring their gun to a firing range, a gunsmith, or a gun show. They must ensure that the firearm is not loaded and is double sealed. Can you tell us how restricting movements will change in terms of the safety that Bill C-71 seeks to enhance in the goal of reducing the violent crime committed against women?
Ms. Martin: As you said, it is a matter of restrictions. If it is easy to move firearms around, the risk that they end up in the wrong hands increases. Moving firearms from one province to another is a factor to consider.
Senator Dagenais: Okay. My second question is for Mr. Mishara. To the best of your knowledge, what impact would expanding background checks on licence applicants beyond five years have on the suicide rate? Also, the current government wants to restrict access to firearms, yet it just made it legal to sell marijuana. Could you tell us what role drugs play when people use registered guns to commit suicide?
Mr. Mishara: I assume that when the bill refers to violence against any person, it includes violence against oneself. A previous suicide attempt is the strongest predictor of future suicide attempts, so if the background check covers previous suicide attempts, I think that can prevent the risk of suicide death.
As for drugs, I would say that alcohol more often plays a role in suicide attempts. In 50 per cent of suicide deaths in Canada, alcohol is found in the person’s bloodstream. Restricting access to means of suicide is highly effective and is often connected with the fact that suicide attempts occur in a crisis situation, when something upsetting has happened to someone who was already at risk.
People don’t make good decisions under the influence of alcohol. Making it easier to access guns increases the chances of someone dying. As the effects of alcohol fade, the person is able to step back from the triggering factor more easily, and the risk of moving from thought to action subsides.
Marijuana isn’t directly associated with the risk of suicide, despite what some people say.
Senator Dagenais: Thank you.
[English]
Senator Jaffer: Thank you for your presentations today.
The very latest Statistics Canada data show that the total number of female victims who reported a firearm-related intimate partner violent incident to the police has increased steadily from 2009 to 2017. The rate of domestic homicide is eight times higher for Indigenous women. Nearly one in five domestic homicide victims died as a result of a shooting. It was around 24 per cent.
Could you explain how the initiative in this bill will address issues of domestic violence? Would you say gun control is really a gender issue?
Ms. Dale: Yes, gun control is a gender issue particularly because, as my colleague said, mostly licensed firearms are used when guns are used to murder women. The numbers are going up. Access to firearms has been less restricted since the repeal of the gun registry.
This bill will assist in two ways. First, it will increase the background check period so that we don’t have undetected incidents of domestic violence because there has been a lull or because a partner may have left. After leaving a partner, all the data we get from the domestic homicide review committees in the provinces that have them show that the period subsequent to leaving is actually the most deadly for women. Extending this period is actually crucial in understanding the gender difference in the use of firearms.
Second, it will assist by allowing for some record of the purchase of a firearm, although the data is protected unless and until there is a criminal investigation and a warrant is sought by the police. It is at least some tool for the police to be able to trace a firearm.
At the moment, we have lower standards for guns than we do for cars in terms of being able to trace where a car might be after a vehicular homicide, for instance. Everybody who has a car licence also has to have it registered so that you can find the person who drove that car.
We don’t have any connection between a gun owner and the actual gun at this point in our history. Our standards right now are lower than those of the U.S.
This actually crawls a bit closer to a standard that is still below that of the United States. Most states will have police able to subpoena those documents once they begin an investigation. They don’t have to go through a warrant process before a judge to find out where the gun was bought. In Canada, with this legislation, the police will at least be able to seek a warrant to find out where a gun was bought.
Senator Jaffer: Since there are many other people who want to ask questions, I won’t ask the others.
Senator McPhedran: I want to correct the record, if indeed that is the case. We have on the record from a previous witness a statement about the constitutional challenge brought by the Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic. Indeed, Ms. Dale, if I recall correctly, you are the named person in that case.
On the record, what we have now about the case being dismissed is:
The reason it was dismissed was that the trial judge found conclusively that there was no link between the long-gun registry, the particular piece of legislation that was repealed, and the rights of individuals as we heard under section 7 of the Charter not to have their rights to life or liberty taken away from them. . . . courts have actually ruled on the issue that there is no such demonstrable link.
I wonder if you might wish to comment on the statement of that previous witness to us.
Ms. Dale: It’s a mischaracterization of the conclusion of the judge. The judge’s conclusion, although not in our favour, was that a very narrow point of law was being decided on, namely, which branch of government is able to instruct what kind of legislation and public policy should be in place.
In other words, the judge ruled in our case that because what we were seeking in our pleadings was a restoration of the gun registry Parliament was within its right to determine what legislation would be in place, that it couldn’t be a particular form of legislation, and that this is a known constitutional issue.
We knew it was a challenging case to bring forward. Because the Statutes Repeal Act was specific to a piece of legislation, it was hard not to advocate for further protections without referring to the specific protections that had been in place. The judge found that we overstepped our ability to instruct Parliament as to what it should be doing through the courts. He wasn’t willing to take that position.
In his very long judgment, which I have read extremely closely, he made the connection between the gun registry and a series of protections for women who experience domestic violence. Like my colleague said from Women’s Shelters Canada, the protections we need in place to ensure that women live lives free from violence are complex and interwoven.
There is no one thing we can do that is — pardon the pun — the magic bullet to ensure women live lives free from violence. It is one of many things that was put in place precisely to protect women from the guns that most often kill them.
Senator Gold: I have a question for all three of you. We heard from the previous panel and indeed before that there is not only a difference between the urban and rural experience but in some sense critics of the bill have suggested that it’s focused on the wrong problem and that we should be focusing more on urban criminals that come to the country and so on and so forth.
Based on research and experience, Professor Mishara and others, could you comment on this ostensible dichotomy between urban and rural experience and, more generally, what is your take on the problem of gun violence in both rural and urban Canada?
Mr. Mishara: I am quite familiar with the situation in Quebec and a little less so for the rest of Canada. In Quebec the rural areas have much higher suicide rates, with the city of Montreal and other cities having the lowest suicide rates. People in rural areas are a particularly vulnerable population.
There’s recent research on farmers being a particularly high-risk group where suicide rates are increasing while they’re decreasing in a number of other groups. Anything we could do to ensure that people who are vulnerable, people who have mental health problems and have previously been suicidal, will have less access or more checks on their access or even the perception that it’s more difficult. There’s research on what’s called cognitive access, that is the idea that maybe it will be as difficult as having a positive effect in preventing suicides.
When you’re considering suicide, it’s even more important to consider measures such as restricting access to firearms in rural Canada. This is a group particularly at high risk, and increasingly we are very concerned about the situation of farmers in Canada.
Ms. Dale: My response to your question is that I am often faced with the assumption that guns are only in the hands of criminals and only used for nefarious means in the hands of criminals. That may be the case for the forms of guns and the forms of violence that threaten men. Men would die more often from guns that are currently restricted. The restrictions that were lifted on the guns that mostly kill women evidence a different pattern. It’s a gender difference in how guns are used in the murder of women.
It’s similar to suicide. The problem is the presence of a gun in an escalating domestic violence situation. It’s not that people who own hunting rifles are in and of themselves bad people. It is the case that those guns are used more often in domestic violence in rural situations. The rates of violence are higher in rural areas, in part because a gun is available during an escalating domestic violence situation. It is a deadly tool. It kills you quickly. If you have it ready to hand when a situation is escalating, it’s more likely to result in homicide, just as my colleague has spoken about in the case of suicide.
Again, there is an element of a cycle of violence, which we can see increasing over time. The escalation of that violence when it’s in the presence of a gun is therefore deadly. People are not criminals until the moment they shoot that gun. When they shoot that gun to murder someone, that’s when they become a criminal. It’s not that we’re looking for patterns of criminality in the case of violence against women. We’re looking for patterns of domestic violence.
Senator Richards: I wish it were true that this would stop femicide, but I just don’t know if it will. I mentioned it before and I will mention it again. I know eight women who were murdered. Not one of them was murdered with a gun.
There is a seven times higher rate of murder among Indigenous women, but constitutionally the First Nations have hunting rights that supersede this gun law.
I am wondering how this will work on a broad scale. I wish it would work. You mentioned that when a person shoots a gun he becomes a criminal. When a person threatens anyone with a gun, he or she becomes a criminal. That’s where I think the difference is.
I just want someone to comment on the idea that a woman would not die if there were no gun present. I wish that were true. I just don’t see that as true.
Ms. Dale: Women die faster and the rates are going up when guns are used. We like to say that there may be the presence of another weapon in the household, but in our service we screen 9,000 women a year. Our primary screening is for the presence or absence of a licensed firearm.
After that, we look for other weapons that may be present in the home. Every home has a knife. Knives can cut bread. They can be used for many things. The gun only has one purpose, and that is to kill.
We look for the presence of a gun in our first line of screening when a woman comes to us. The reason for that is if we can keep her alive one more day, we can help her make a safety plan so that the other weapons can’t be used.
Senator Richards: Did you want to comment, Ms. Martin?
Ms. Martin: It is interesting to bring up individual stories, but this is not an individual issue. You know of eight women who have regrettably been murdered without a gun. We’re talking about systems here. We all know many women are also killed without a gun, but we’re talking about incremental change. We have to begin somewhere. Just speaking of one life is already too many.
Senator Richards: I know and I don’t mean to argue with you. I know 11 women who also hunt and they have guns in their houses. I’ve hunted birds and deer with them. They’re not at all frightened of guns. We can continually bring up these kinds of criteria.
Like I say, when those eight women died, they died by other means. That’s all I was trying to say.
[Translation]
Senator Pratte: Professor Mishara, you mentioned certain studies about the link between suicide and the presence of guns in a home, for example. We heard from a previous witness, Dr. Langmann, who studied the link between gun control legislation and suicides in Canada.
Let me quote from his testimony:
[English]
Suicide by firearms in Canada has been on a steady decline since the 1980s. Suicide by other methods have been on a slow, steady increase. Recent analysis performed by myself on this data demonstrates no significant change in the decline post-legislation in the 1990s.
Dr. Langmann appears to be saying that there is no efficacy of gun control legislation on firearm suicides. Is that your view of the research on that topic?
Mr. Mishara: There are other published articles. For example, the Leenaars study in 2007 showed a very significant decrease in firearms deaths in Canada and a proportional decrease in overall suicide deaths following the introduction of Bill C-51. His conclusion was that it wasn’t all age groups but that there were significant reductions in several age groups.
One of the problems in conducting research on suicide is that access to firearms is just one of many factors influencing suicide rates. Since 1999 in Quebec, the suicide rate for all age groups went down every year. In 10 years it was half the rate among youths. That’s the same with all methods. In 1999, Quebec established a suicide prevention strategy that is most likely to be the causal factor in all this.
We’re going through a period in Canada where in general suicides have been declining. When they decline in one method and don’t decline in the other proportionally, it appears the other method is going up even though the actual number of deaths may be the same.
You have to look at a lot of different factors involved, but the impact is clear in every place where there has been some control. There are a few exceptions. In Austria, when they had severe gun control legislation, they saw no immediate impact on suicide rates. However, during that same period, they were undergoing a phenomenal economic recession. As soon as the recession ended, the impact on gun deaths went down again. Their interpretation was that it was compensated by other factors.
There’s enough evidence that restricting access to any means works. In England and in all of Europe now, they restrict the number of Tylenol capsules available in the house. Getting a blister pack of 12, instead of 150 from Costco, saves lives because when people in crisis go to take something find less lethal medication. I mention this because Tylenol is the number one cause of poisoning deaths. It can be something as simple as that.
Senator Pratte: Ms. Dale, you wrote an op-ed in the Toronto Star last year that the issue for far too long had been framed as one of gangs and guns, pitting urban elites against law-abiding rural gun owners. You advocated a paradigm shift. Would you care to elaborate?
Ms. Dale: The discussion at this committee has demonstrated that most Canadians are somehow connected to the rural area. Our degrees of separation are not so big. I straddle those two worlds; I grew up in both those two worlds.
Evidence is our best friend when we’re trying to make public policy. Rhetorical polarization does not help us make sound decisions. I look at data and the data show me that the rates of crime and violence against women in particular are higher outside the urban areas. Because of the density of Toronto, my own clinic is seeing numbers like 9,000 women, which by the way is a 100 per cent increase over the last three years.
The rates of violence against women do not spell a picture of gangs and guns although women lose the men in their lives to gangs and guns. It’s a form of violence that affects women very deeply in urban areas. The guns used to murder women are not the same guns used to murder men. We have not quite caught up to that gender difference, just as we haven’t caught up to gender differences in medicine.
When we talk about the experience of the women with whom we work, I fear we get lost in the agendas of other people which transcend this issue and are trying to argue a different point. The point is very simple and very evidence based. We need public policy that recognizes it.
Senator Griffin: My brilliant question was already asked by Senator Jaffer, but I would like to follow up on it a bit further. I was going to ask about specifics, and you mentioned the specifics in the bill that might make a difference in dealing with domestic violence or violence against women in general. You said that this bill only crawled closer to protection for women.
I don’t know if you’ve ever applied for a possession licence for a firearm. One of its sections has to be signed off by the applicant’s spouse. For instance, when I applied for mine, my husband had to sign off on it.
Basically you may be hinting that has had little or no effect.
Ms. Dale: I am absolutely sure it’s a necessary step. My concern was more that the traceability of the firearm is still very weak and requires judicial oversight. The background check is not infallible but is necessary.
If the signing off on the background check is not verified by a firearms officer, it could be coerced. In a situation where there was ongoing domestic violence, it could be coerced. If there is no verification by local police that might know if they’ve been called to that household for domestic violence, then you’re correct it’s not infallible and could be subject to coercion.
Senator Griffin: I think it’s safe to say we’re dealing with a multi-faceted problem. To use your point or someone’s point, there is no magic bullet in dealing with this issue. It’s probably a number of incremental steps.
Some very good points were made by the previous panel. You may have heard them. The indication was that there need to be other resources to deal with these social issues. The unfortunate point is that this bill has very little impact on them. When the bill was introduced it was advertised as delivering more than it will be able to deliver.
Ms. Dale: I have a doctorate in law. I would say that my studies in law have taught me one thing, which is that the law is only the outer limit of what is socially acceptable. Everything else is up to the rest of us. It’s up to policy and public funding so that we can actually make those laws real.
Without the laws, we have nothing. Right now we have nothing. We have a lower standard than that of the United States when it comes to gun control in Canada. This is a shocking truth that is not a rhetorical flourish. It is absolutely factual. Most Canadians would be shocked to know that.
This brings us to a minimum standard that puts us in the same ballpark as some of the more advanced Western nations but still below most of them. In the international context, there are more controls in all of Europe than we have in Canada. The rhetoric that we are somehow grabbing a whole bunch of power around this is not the case. We have very low standards. This starts to inch toward a minimum standard that puts us in the same club as Western industrialized nations.
Senator Griffin: Right now we don’t have nothing; we do have something. The question is: What is the standard?
Senator Wells: I appreciate the work you’ve done in your respective fields.
I want to talk to you about the proposal within the bill to enhance background checks to cover an individual’s life history. We all know that early life is not always an indicator of later in life.
Aside from the regular background checks that are a normal part of the process, do you see any holes in this aspect of the bill? If so, how do we fill those holes to make it fair for those who are applying for guns?
Mr. Mishara: Perhaps I comment on the idea of a previous suicide attempt, if that came up in a background check. Basically, people who attempt suicide once, even earlier in life, are the highest risk group in Canada to attempt suicide again.
The chances are higher because not everyone is capable of initiating an act to kill themselves. Some people may feel desperate but killing yourself is not easy to do. If someone has tried it once, it’s an indication that they are part of a subgroup of people who are capable of doing it.
For me, that would certainly be a red flag about possessing a means to kill oneself in the future. The fact that it’s earlier in life, it’s still statistically an important risk factor as are severe mental health problems involving violence. Those sorts of things earlier in life are still an indication that there is a greater risk of violence later in life when they’re associated with a diagnosis and treatment for a severe mental health problem.
I am confident, as much as one can be in scientific evidence, that lives will be saved if some of those people do not have access to weapons, to guns, as a result of this legislation.
Senator Wells: Given that and that I don’t know a lot about suicide, there is no central registry of attempted suicides. How could that be captured in any kind of background check, let alone an entire life history background check?
Mr. Mishara: I don’t know about the practicalities. When people in Europe apply for a gun permit, it is interesting that one of the questions in several of those countries is: Have you previously attempted suicide? It is astonishing the number of people who tick off yes.
If someone is trying to hide something from their past, they can certainly not be honest in these sorts of things. I would hope that’s one of the antecedents covered by the phrase “violence . . . against any person.” I consider a suicide attempt violence against oneself. If you sign a document and you’re supposed to be completely honest to get your gun permit, registration or whatever, there’s a tendency for a certain number of people to be honest about it.
This will not solve the suicide problem in Canada, but based upon experiences elsewhere lives will be saved. When that life is your son, daughter, husband or wife, you would do anything to have that person continue to be alive.
Ms. Martin: The same applies in terms of violence against women. The data show that a perpetrator will often be violent toward several partners over time and that the five years is too limiting. As I say, saving one life is as important as saving hundreds of lives.
Senator Wells: You mentioned earlier, Ms. Martin, that we were dealing with the system. You’re correct, but one of the concerns I have is that there is a cog in a bureaucratic system checking a box that says nothing has shown up in our background checks. That could happen within the five-year mark or something previous that would not be known. It’s those kinds of gaps that we would hope to fill if we are to use this provision as part of the bill.
My concern is that the gap may not be filled but may be a box ticked. That’s a concern because it doesn’t address what that aspect is trying to address.
Ms. Dale: With all legislation and all regulation, it’s important to properly equip those who are fulfilling the legislation to do it.
The police would tell you they need the means to be able to do background checks properly. CPIC will pick up any medical emergency that involves a suicide. It should pick up any report of domestic violence known to police. If the police are able to do the background checks as they are supposed to, then it should catch all these kinds of past incidents.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: I personally think that if we want to reduce the suicide rate, we would have to totally eliminate firearms at home, which would be completely unrealistic, in my view.
Mr. Mishara, are you familiar with the 2007 study published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy? That study compares suicide rates in European countries. For instance, Greece has three times more gun ownership than its neighbour, the Czech Republic, yet the Czech suicide rate is 175 per cent higher than the Greek rate. Sweden, which has twice as much gun ownership as neighbouring Germany, has a suicide rate that’s three times lower. Spain has 12 times more gun ownership than Poland, yet Poland has double the Spanish suicide rate. This study shows that socio-economic factors are much more significant than the presence of a firearm. Are you familiar with this study?
Mr. Mishara: I’m aware of the various studies that have examined the various factors related to the risk of suicide. It’s funny you should mention Greece, because that country historically had a low suicide rate. After its economic crisis, however, Greece experienced an unbelievable surge in suicides, especially firearms suicides.
I’m not saying that limiting access to guns will prevent all suicides, but the research is very clear.
Senator Boisvenu: We can agree that the presence of a gun isn’t the dominant factor that leads someone to commit suicide. It may be a factor. A gun may be used, but the dominant factors are more sociological, not the presence of a firearm.
Mr. Mishara: There are all kinds of factors related to the risk of suicide. However, you can’t kill yourself if you don’t have the means. As I’ve already said, more than half of suicides occur in a crisis situation. The person is already at risk due to sociological and psychological factors and their mental health. The vast majority of people who have financial or mental health problems will never commit suicide, but these factors increase the risk. But they can’t commit suicide unless they have the means. Say my girlfriend leaves me for someone else. I find out, I start drinking, and if there’s a gun around, I’m at much greater risk of committing suicide.
Senator Boisvenu: Would you agree that if there is no gun around and there are very strong aggravating sociological and economic factors, a person will use other means besides a gun to commit suicide?
Mr. Mishara: Other means aren’t as lethal. Most people who swallow pills change their minds and call 911, so their lives are saved. They won’t die. But if they use a gun, they don’t have a chance to change their minds. With methods that are less lethal, there is less of a risk of dying.
Furthermore, in a crisis situation, if a person has suitable means at home, if a person has a gun, all the research shows that the risk of suicide is higher. If a person needs —
[English]
The Chair: If I can intervene, we are way over our time. I appreciate your trying to answer the question. I want to take this opportunity to thank all panellists very much for a very informative hour. I appreciate your making the trip to help our learning on this bill.
We are now pleased to welcome the Honourable Minister Ralph Goodale to speak today. He is accompanied by Randall Koops, Director General, Policing Policy, Public Safety Canada; Kellie Paquette, Director General, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police; Robert Mackinnon, Director, Firearms Business Improvement Directorate, Royal Canadian Mounted Police; and Alexandra Budgell, Team Leader and Senior Counsel, Department of Justice Canada.
Hon. Ralph Goodale, P.C., M.P., Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness: If you would allow me just a moment or two off the top, Madam Chair, I have a word or two I would like to say with respect to the situation that occurred last week in New Zealand.
Decent people around the world continue to grieve today in the wake of last Friday’s vicious terror attack on innocent worshippers at prayer in two mosques in New Zealand. The anguish is especially acute in Muslim communities, but we all share the pain. Fifty lives were lost. Many more were seriously wounded. We stand in solidarity with our New Zealand allies and with Muslim communities there, here in Canada and world wide.
This appalling tragedy brings back awful echoes of Sainte-Foy just over two years ago, where six innocent Canadian citizens were killed while at prayer in a mosque. Hatred, Islamaphobia and right-wing extremist violence have no place in our society. Everyone should be able to practise their religion peacefully, safely and without fear.
New Zealand is one of Canada’s partners in the Five Eyes security and intelligence alliance, along with Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. I have spoken with my New Zealand counterpart, Justice Minister Andrew Little, to offer Canada’s condolences, our solidarity and support. We will, of course, assist New Zealand any way in which we are requested.
I will meet Minister Little at a full gathering of Five Eyes ministers this summer in Manchester. He and I both agree that we need strong discussions about all sources of risks and threats to our decent civilized way of life, including from white supremacists, neo-Nazis and perpetrators of right-wing extremist violence and their access to social media platforms to spread their hate and mayhem.
All Canadian police, security and intelligence agencies have been working, as assiduously as they always do, to keep Canadians safe. I should note that there are no factors known to our officials which would prompt any change in Canada’s current threat level at this time. That level is set at medium. It has remained stable at that level since October 2014.
Of course, the status quo is always under review. If any change is necessary, it will be made.
Like many parliamentarians, I spent time this past weekend with Muslim leaders and members of the community in mosques and other places in my home constituency in Regina. At this time, it is vital for all of us to stand together, shoulder to shoulder, and we are.
I also note that another terror-related situation seems to be unfolding today in Netherlands. We are following that with great care and attention too. It is still very early in that investigation, but we are watching it with a great deal of concern.
Madam Chair, thank you for inviting me to appear today with respect to Bill C-71, and thank you for introducing the officials that I have with me from Public Safety Canada, the RCMP and the Department of Justice.
Let me begin with this: While crime rates generally have been steadily falling in Canada for decades, we have seen a sharp increase in the number of criminal incidents involving firearms. From 2013 to 2017, the last year for which we have a full set of statistics, those incidents have grown by 44 per cent. This includes roughly a 30 per cent increase in incidents of intimate partner violence where a firearm was present, a 45 per cent increase in break and enters for the purpose of stealing a firearm, and a 99 per cent increase in homicides involving firearms.
In addition to this trend, there is great variation in the types of firearms being used for criminal activity across the country. While much of the violence in Toronto involves handguns, on the Prairies it is more typically long guns. Three out of ten violent gun-related crimes happen outside of major urban centres.
That brings me to the purpose of this testimony today. Part 1 of Bill C-71 is derived entirely from the explicit election commitments we made to Canadians which included a comprehensive package of firearms initiatives, each designed to enhance public safety.
There were some provinces, such as our guns and gangs initiative, which do not actually require legislation. We are honouring those promises through policy and budgetary decisions. The budget money is starting to flow to the provinces and through them to municipal and local police forces. We are also investing some $50 million at the border over the next five years to help CBSA stem the illicit flow of guns from the United States, and there is an allocation of about $35 million to the RCMP for their domestic activity.
Reversing the recent trend in firearm crime requires a comprehensive approach, and we are taking action on many fronts. Bill C-71 contains elements that require legislative change.
First and foremost, we promise to require enhanced background checks for firearms licence applicants. This was largely based on the private member’s bill of former Conservative MP James Moore back in the Thirty-seventh Parliament. It was then called Bill C-442. The current Firearms Act says that a Chief Firearms Officer must have regard to a licensed applicant’s past five years of behaviour. Bill C-442 and now Bill C-71 would require CFOs to have a closer look at an applicant’s life history, not just the last five years.
Upon introduction of his bill, Mr. Moore had this to say:
My private member’s bill does not say after five years: it says if a person has ever committed a violent crime in their life never does that person get to own a gun. If a person has ever beat his wife or ever committed rape or ever committed murder and is released from jail, never in his life does that person get to own a gun in Canada.
It was a good point back in 2004 when he first introduced the idea, and it remains a good point today.
MPs in the House of Commons committee, when they were dealing with Bill C-71, paid particular attention to issues around the background checks. In fact, in many ways they strengthened the provisions of the legislation to ensure that those background checks would be effective.
Second, we promised to require the purchasers of non-restricted firearms to show a firearms licence and require the seller to confirm that the licence was valid before a transaction between them could be completed. This will involve a quick call to the firearms program phone number to confirm the validity of the licence, and that is the purpose of the call: to verify that a transaction between these two people is legal and authorized because the proper licences are in place and are valid at the time the transaction takes place. That is the only purpose for that phone call to be made to the firearms program.
Many people have told me that requiring someone to show a valid licence to purchase a long gun is just common sense. Others have told me this is already required by the law. The truth is that it was a requirement until 2012 for all long guns.
It is still a requirement for restricted and prohibited weapons, and we are now reinstating it for all firearms including long guns.
As an example of why this is important, consider this hypothetical example: A customer who is a regular at a local firearms store has recently run into some difficulty in his life and has had his licence revoked by the Chief Firearms Officer and his firearms confiscated by law enforcement. The store owner may or may not know that. If the store owner is used to doing business with the particular person on a regular basis, he might have no reason to believe that the customer didn’t have a valid licence because he always had one. The store owner just might in absolute good faith sell him a new firearm even though the licence was no longer valid or in place.
If you don’t check, you won’t know for sure, and we are correcting that deficiency.
During the election we also promised two other important and related things: number one, that we would not bring back the long-gun registry and number two, that we would require firearms vendors to keep records of sales to assist police to track weapons found at the scene of a crime.
On the first point, I was very pleased to see the members of the House of Commons committee add an amendment to the bill for greater certainty when they considered Bill C-71 that ensures nobody can confuse this bill with a new long-gun registry. Specifically, the proposed amendment put forward by Mr. Pierre Paul-Hus in the House of Commons committee said this:
For greater certainty, nothing in this Act shall be construed so as to permit or require the registration of non-restricted firearms.
The committee agreed, and that is now part of Bill C-71.
In regard to record keeping, this was a requirement in the stores of commercial vendors from the mid-1970s up until the creation of the previous long-gun registry. Once the registry was created and all long guns were registered directly to an owner there was obviously no need for record keeping by vendors, and this requirement was done away with.
In the absence now of a long-gun registry it makes sense to restore this important element of commercial bookkeeping to help police track down owners of firearms found at a crime scene. I note that the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police has been very strong in their support of this key measure.
To those who say this is too onerous, I would point out that reputable vendors such as Canadian Tire and Cabela’s already keep track of their firearm sales. When you purchase a firearm or ammunition at Cabela’s, you will see your PAL number right on the receipt and recorded in the system.
I would also point out that similar vendor record-keeping requirements have been in place in the United States since the 1950s. Indeed, the National Rifle Association even sells record-keeping books to store owners to help them meet their record-keeping requirements.
Our platform also promised to put decision making about weapon classifications back into the hands of RCMP technical experts instead of at the cabinet table.
In 2015, the Firearms Act was amended to allow the Governor-in-Council to downgrade the actual classification of a firearm. The previous government did so for two weapons: the CZ858 and the Swiss Arms weapon, making them non-restricted. Bill C-71 proposes to do away with that order-in-council power in the hands of the Governor-in-Council, the effect of which is that both of these now down-rated firearms would automatically revert once Bill C-71 is passed to their actual higher classification status.
For those who purchased one of those weapons in good faith as a non-restricted weapon, we are allowing a grandfathering regime if they possessed one before June 30, 2018. In order to be eligible for the grandfathering, an owner would have to qualify for the appropriate licence. That will take a bit of time. In order to allow time for them to do so in an orderly manner, the government intends to publish an amnesty period for those two types of firearms once Bill C-71 receives Royal Assent.
This brings me to our promise on the transportation of restricted and prohibited weapons. Again, let me underscore that these transportation issues relate to restricted and prohibited weapons, not to non-restricted weapons.
Until 2015, an owner of a restricted or prohibited firearm was required to apply for and receive an authorization to transport, an ATT, every time they wanted to take their firearm anywhere. Since 2015, owners have had an automatic ATT attached to their licence that allows them to take the firearm to a shooting range, a gun show, a firearms business or a port of entry.
There are currently about 4,500 firearms businesses across the country. That volume makes it incredibly difficult for police officers to provide a challenge function if they come across someone who they suspect is transporting a restricted firearm illegally. Essentially, the strict transportation rules for restricted firearms have been rendered pretty useless as the rules have become almost impossible to enforce from a law enforcement perspective. The police, however, tend to know where all the local firing ranges are. They can make a determination if a person is transporting a restricted firearm, if that person is likely headed to a range or back home from a range.
To ensure that the limits on transporting restricted weapons meaningfully add to public safety, Bill C-71 proposes to end the automatic ATTs for all purposes except transport to and from a licensed firing range. Prior to 2015, travel to ranges accounted for the vast majority of all ATT applications, probably about 95 per cent.
The result of the change we are proposing would therefore help police officers ensure that restricted weapons are not being transported illegally, while at the same time creating minimal inconvenience to law-abiding firearms owners.
Finally, I would like to address some of the concerns I have heard raised as I’ve watched the debate about Bill C-71 as it makes its way through Parliament. I have two points in particular.
First is the effect of the new ATT requirements on hunting. While currently no Chief Firearms Officer will issue an authorization to transport for a restricted or prohibited weapon in order to hunt because for many decades the only firearms people have been allowed to hunt with are non-restricted long guns, Bill C-71 changes nothing in relation to hunting and hunting traditions.
I have also heard the concern that requiring CFOs to consider a firearms licence applicant’s entire life history may prevent Indigenous hunters from receiving a licence. In such circumstances, an Indigenous applicant can make use of the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada Adaptations Regulations.
These regulations allow an applicant to include a letter from an elder attesting to the fact that a firearm is needed for the traditional practice of hunting. It is a system that has worked reasonably well for some 20 years, and it will continue to be in place under Bill C-71.
I am also aware that there is some interest among senators in updating the non-derogation of Indigenous and treaty rights clause found in the interpretation section not of Bill C-71 but of the parent legislation, the Firearms Act. While amending sections of the parent act of Bill C-71 would be out of scope and out of order in the House of Commons, the Rules of the Senate are different.
I would be very interested to see what type of an update senators might have in mind, what the language might look at, and how Indigenous people would respond to any proposed improvements in the wording of non-derogation clauses.
Madam Chair, you have been very patient. I appreciate the opportunity to appear today. I know my time was due to expire right at two o’clock in order to allow me to get to question period in the House of Commons, but I believe we can let the clock run for a few minutes past two o’clock. I will try to spend as much time as I can. I thank you for the opportunity to be here.
The Chair: Thank you, minister. We appreciate that.
Senator Jaffer: I want to thank you, minister, for your statement on New Zealand and to convey to the Prime Minister how much Muslim Canadians have appreciated your and the Prime Minister’s work on this issue. I can tell you that your words have given us all great solace. This is a hard time for all of us.
The time is limited, so my question will be very tight. I have received, as have all my colleagues, many letters to the effect that you are taking away rights of gun owners and that you are punishing lawful citizens for the acts of criminals and gangs. Every day, we get letters. What do you say to that?
Mr. Goodale: Thank you for your remarks, Senator Jaffer.
We worked very hard in putting Bill C-71 together to avoid any unreasonable or unfair burden on law-abiding gun owners. The vast majority of people who make use of firearms in Canada do so legally and properly within the law. They comply with all of the rules and procedures. They do so in a respectful and responsible manner.
In putting together the provisions of the legislation, we have tried not to encroach upon their rights or practices in any way that is unfair or unreasonable. Obviously a public safety issue needs to be addressed. You can see that in the statistics that I referred to at the outset. Incidentally, if senators would like further elaboration on the statistics, we would be happy to provide it. The numbers come directly from Statistics Canada. We would be happy to indicate how this trend has developed over the period since 2013.
I refer again to the changes that we’re proposing to make with respect to the transportation authorizations. For example, we have tried to focus on where the problem may be to assist law enforcement in such a way that it would leave about 95 per cent of those who would be transporting these particular types of firearms entirely unaffected.
I could go through all of the provisions of the bill to show where those kinds of considerations have applied, but we have a public safety issue that needs to be addressed. We’re trying to do that in a respectful and responsible way. We’re doing it, we believe, without imposing any unreasonable or unrealistic burden.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Minister, thank you for your presentation.
If passed, Bill C-71 would hinder law-abiding gun owners from travelling to sporting events. Athletes shooting in Olympic competitions are voicing criticism, because it won’t be easy for them to quickly secure authorization to transport a firearm. For example, if they go to the gunsmith on Friday night for a competition the next morning, who’s going to make sure the police can get them their ATT quickly? What measures are you going to take to ensure you don’t penalize these people?
Remote areas don’t have many police officers per square kilometre, because there’s often only one police car, and it may be busy on another call. That means it will be hard for people to get an ATT. Would you be open to adopting certain amendments to fix this issue?
[English]
Mr. Goodale: Senator Dagenais, I am always open to considering constructive amendments at any time. I note, when the House of Commons considered this legislation, that amendments were accepted from all three political parties as the bill made its way through the standing committee. If there are ways in which you believe this process can be improved, we’re certainly prepared to consider all good ideas.
I would note on your point specifically about transportation authorizations, first of all, that this applies only in the case of restricted and prohibitive weapons.
Second, roughly speaking 95 per cent of the likely trips where a weapon of this nature would be transported will be exempt from the requirement. If they’re going to a recognized shooting range then that’s exempt from the requirement of getting a specific ATT.
Third, we are working with the Canadian Firearms Program to make sure that the service standards provided by the program are conducive to treating the public in a proper and responsive way. If somebody is phoning in to get their licence verification number, they should be able to do that promptly and properly, with proper service, and not be lost in the limbo land on hold for hours on end. We’re working to improve those service standards and to make the service available online so that you can in fact do it with a mobile application of the technology.
With those upgrades, we’re hoping to ensure that no one is put to any unreasonable inconvenience.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: We know that Indigenous communities see their share of violent crime. How would you respond to groups that think the restrictions should generally apply to Indigenous communities as well, so as to reduce the number of guns in those communities?
[English]
Mr. Goodale: The laws, of course, are of universal application when it comes to public safety, the Criminal Code, the firearms legislation and so forth. Through the application of non-derogation clauses in our laws, as you know, there is protection for Indigenous rights and principles that apply to Indigenous people.
I referred to one of them in my remarks. If an Indigenous person is applying for a licence or a transportation authorization and the Chief Firearms Officer has reservations, it’s possible for the Indigenous person to have the attestation of an elder. That is provided for under the terms of the Indigenous or the Aboriginal peoples regulations that apply under this legislation.
The whole objective here is to make our law effective and to do so in a way that is culturally respectful. Those provisions have been in place for the better part of 20 years. They seem to have functioned pretty successfully under the law over the course of the last two decades.
Senator Griffin: I am thinking about retail operators, people who sell the firearms. By the way, it was a great idea to take the decision away from the executive council and put it into the hands of the experts in the RCMP in terms of whether weapons classification would be changed to prohibited. That was a great move. However, no matter who is making the decision, at the end of the day shop owners will have stock that may all of a sudden be prohibited.
Do you have some way in mind to grandfather or to mitigate the impact on these legitimate businesses because of a change in classification of the stock they are selling?
Mr. Goodale: On the issue of classification I appreciate your endorsement there. By removing the previous power to reclassify downward by means of an order-in-council, we recognized that we would be affecting an existing inventory retroactively. That is why we provided a grandfathering regime within the legislation so that appropriate arrangements could be made.
If people had acquired one of these firearms in good faith under a regime that was completely legal, and then the law changed and put them offside, that was not their fault. We have tried to recognize that regime by putting the grandfathering provisions in the law.
We selected a date, which was June 30, 2018, to give people ample notice that the rules were to change and that they should make appropriate arrangements. Unfortunately, when you’re changing things that have a retroactive consequence, it’s not entirely possible to absolutely blanket the situation and avoid every anomaly. We tried to do that by giving people a lot of advance notice so that they could make arrangements to protect themselves.
Senator Griffin: In terms of shop owners who might have a large inventory, how would that work? I see how it works for the individual.
Mr. Goodale: Shop owners would have that same notice. They would know that their market was to change after a certain date. They too would have had sufficient time to prepare for what would ultimately be the change in the law.
Of course, we were also trying to be very careful not to presume what the outcome of Parliament’s decision might ultimately be. There have been difficulties with that in the past. We’ve tried to take into account the parliamentary procedural issues at the same time by inserting that to give both buyers and sellers advance notice there was likely to be a change in future and they might take appropriate steps to safeguard their commercial position.
Senator Griffin: I don’t understand why an ATT is required to take a restricted firearm to a gunsmith. I can see how it might be required in other cases, but if you are allowing people to take it to and from the range and the home, why can they not take it to a gunsmith without an ATT? It would seem to be a good thing to actually have the firearm in good working order.
Mr. Goodale: Your latter point is very well taken. No one wants defective firearms in use. The challenge, though, for law enforcement is that where they are very aware of where firing ranges are and where sporting competitions are taking place and so forth, there are 4,500 commercial locations, gun shops and gunsmiths across the country where an owner may be taking a firearm. It would be very difficult for the police to anticipate all of those locations. That’s what they have indicated to us because the gun could be going in so many different directions. Without having a sort of interactive colour-coded map, it would be very difficult for the police to perform a challenge function, to say the gun shop is over there. Why are you going over there?
They know the ranges, but it’s difficult to accumulate the database on the other side. I note that this would affect something less than 5 per cent of the transportation movements, at least on a historical basis. So that doesn’t seem to be a large imposition on the needs of firearms owners.
Senator McIntyre: Thank you, minister, for being here today to answer our questions.
Minister, when your officials provided a pre-briefing on Bill C-71, they noted that resources have not yet been allocated for life screening. Have you estimated how much life screening will cost? And when will those resources be known?
Mr. Goodale: Just let me consult on that.
Senator, the work to quantify that is ongoing. You make the point, though, if the screening needs to be done — and under Bill C-71 it will need to be done — the firearms program will need to have the appropriate resources to do the job that the law is asking them to do and the government will make the funding available through the normal appropriations for the RCMP.
Senator McIntyre: Can you assure us that the cost of life-time screening will not take resources away from other public safety activities carried out by Chief Firearms Officers?
Mr. Goodale: No, the objective here is not internal reallocation, where a new responsibility is being created. Then there would need to be new resources to pay for it.
Senator McIntyre: Under the proposed measures in Bill C-71, conditions will now be attached to business licences requiring them to record and keep information for a minimum period of 20 years or longer as prescribed by regulation. How was this retention period of 20 years decided and what was the basis for that decision?
Mr. Goodale: As I indicated in my remarks, senator, these rules used to be in place before there was a long-gun registry. When the long-gun registry came into effect, it made the previous record-keeping regime redundant. Now the long-gun registry has been abolished. It would seem appropriate to re-establish those record-keeping rules that previously exist.
I am advised by my officials that the 20-year standard is what is commonly adhered to in the United States, and it is the international standard for record keeping of this kind.
Senator McIntyre: My final question has to do with the Canadian Firearms Advisory Committee. My understanding, minister, is that an Indigenous person was originally included in the membership of that committee. As I understand, the member has since withdrawn. Have you completed the membership for that committee?
Mr. Goodale: Yes, we have. The committee is now at full complement. There has been a change in the chair, and there’s been the addition of an Indigenous person to fill out that position.
You’re right. When we made the original selection, an Indigenous person was included in the first roster. Unfortunately, that person was not able to continue, and we had to fill the vacancy. The vacancy has been filled. The last name is Creyke. I will provide you with a full list of the membership of that committee, including a biography on all of the members, both the ones that continue and the new ones that have been added.
Senator McIntyre: Thank you, minister.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you, Minister Goodale and your officials, for your attention to public safety and, in particular, the impact of guns on women and children in Canada caught in domestic violence.
Some opponents of this bill say that it harasses law-abiding gun owners while doing nothing to fight gangs using illegal handguns. That gun owners with legal guns are not responsible for the alarming increase in gun crime that you cited so clearly here today, that the increase in crime is due to handguns.
As important as this bill is for public and personal safety in Canada, minister, there is not much in here to deal with handguns. Yet, clause 16 in this bill does propose to amend subsection 84(1) of the Criminal Code which is exactly the subsection that could be amended to add handguns to the prohibited firearm list in the code.
Minister, as you well know, the federal election date is rapidly approaching, limiting our time as lawmakers this year. Would you consider taking action against the proliferation of handguns by amending this bill to define handguns as prohibited firearms in subsection 84(1) of the code?
Mr. Goodale: Senator, thank you for the question. My response is really twofold. One, that specific question and several others have been referred by the Prime Minister to Minister Bill Blair to consult about, and his work has been ongoing for the last number of months. I expect that he will have something important to say about his consultation in the period immediately ahead. He has been hard at work on this, and he has heard from hundreds if not thousands of Canadians. A decision by the government on that matter would need to await his recommendation, but they will be forthcoming very shortly.
The other technical point, and I would defer to others on this who are parliamentary experts, but I am told that type of amendment would actually be potentially outside the scope of the legislation. I know you might make an argument on the other side, and I could hear the beginnings of that argument starting. Fair enough. From a technical point of view, I think it would be out of scope. The more practical answer is that Minister Bill Blair has been hard at work on this, listening to Canadians for a considerable period of time. He has timed his work in order to be able to report more fulsomely in the spring.
I think he will be here in the next week that Parliament sits. He might be able to offer an update at that time, but we await his recommendations.
Senator Pratte: Minister, thank you for being here. I have two questions regarding ATTs and the implementation of the changes that are brought forward by the bill.
This may appear like getting into the details of the implementation, but it’s important because there is a lot of concern in the firearms community about how this will be implemented.
One thing that I’ve heard time and again is that the gun owners don’t want to go back to the paper ATTs where the ATTs had to be mailed out, which obviously took some time. Do I understand from what you said earlier that there could be some kind of electronic process where ATTs would not be mailed, so that it would not go back to paper ATTs?
Mr. Goodale: Certainly, Senator Pratte. This activity is a form of government service to the public. Parliament will be deciding to establish a new law and a regulatory regime that goes along with it. That requires the public to do certain things, and the Government of Canada needs to ensure that, to the maximum extent possible, we provide electronic and digital services to the consuming public.
In fact, you may have noticed in today’s appointment of a new President of the Treasury Board that part of her title is the Minister Responsible for Digital Government. That is a signal that the Government of Canada is trying very hard to make its services more readily available in electronic forms.
Will it all happen instantaneously? Obviously there is a transition we need to work through, but our goal is to provide the public in this field and every other with services that are expeditious, convenient and respond to their normal day-to-day needs using technology to the maximum extent possible. Our goal is to get there, indeed.
Senator Pratte: Another concern often expressed with the new licence verification system is whether this will be available on Thursday and Friday evenings when people often and during weekends when gun shows mostly happen, or will people have to wait until eight o’clock on Monday morning to call the service in question?
Mr. Goodale: The hours for the functioning of the call centre are intended to be staggered appropriately across the country so that they meet normal working hours whether in Atlantic Canada or in the Pacific region.
I am advised, for many of the gun shows, that if they’re anticipating a flow of business at a gun show on a particular weekend, the organizers of the show will advise the firearms program in advance. Most of the big ones automatically do that because it’s part of how they function successfully. Then the call centre will be able to arrange their functioning to be available to service customers.
Whether in this field, CRA, OAS or whatever, service standards for delivering to the Canadian public are a critical dimension of government performance. We need to improve the level by which we try to meet the public’s expectations. Whether it’s acquiring a licence, verifying a licence, getting an ATT in this particular field, getting your answer on a tax problem with CRA, getting the appropriate response from a social services agency or whatever, service standards need to be a constant preoccupation for government departments.
Senator Wells: Minister Goodale, first, between 2014 and 2017, 66 per cent of all homicides by firearms were committed by people with criminal records, which would indicate that two-thirds of homicides were the consequence of a failure to enforce current laws and regulations because it’s already illegal for someone with a criminal record to have a firearm. Second, between those same dates, 60 per cent of all homicides by firearms were committed with a restricted or prohibited weapon. This would indicate a near failure or perhaps a complete failure of our gun control system because restricted and prohibited weapons are registered and tightly controlled.
In light of this, is the government suggesting that creating more laws and regulations will improve safety when the evidence suggests that would be false and that this law actually appears to target law-abiding Canadians?
Mr. Goodale: With respect, senator, you’re misinterpreting our intent. By the provisions that improve and strengthen the system of background checks we’re trying to ensure to the maximum extent humanly possible that for those people who should not have a weapon for the reasons you mention, or for other reasons that the CFO may come across, the screening system is as good as it can possibly be by improving the way in which licences are verified.
Again, we’re trying to make sure when a transaction is ongoing between a buyer and seller that they are authorized to conduct the transaction. I gave a hypothetical example in my remarks about how something might fall between the stools.
When we’re establishing a record-keeping system for commercial businesses, that is directly intended to help the police in tracking crime guns. The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police has been very strong in advocating that regime be put in place, just as they are supportive of the new rules we have proposed around ATTs.
The whole purpose here is to have a safety regime that has the practical consequences of helping to keep Canadians safer, while at the same time not imposing an unreasonable burden on law-abiding gun owners who are the vast majority of gun owners in this country. We believe we have struck an appropriate balance in Bill C-71.
Senator Wells: I have one more brief question. It is a Saskatchewan question so it should be easy for you, Minister Goodale.
According to StatsCan, between 2014 and 2017 Saskatchewan had 42 homicides that were firearm related. The majority of these were rural, 52 per cent. Alarmingly, 77 per cent of persons accused of firearm-related homicides during that period in Saskatchewan were classified by Statistics Canada as Aboriginal.
You mentioned earlier the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada Adaptations Regulations. What will the provisions of this bill do to address the issue that I just mentioned? Is this a clear danger in an identified group, or are these communities simply set aside with respect to Bill C-71?
Mr. Goodale: The law is applicable to everyone. There are specific provisions under regulations that are made in respect of Indigenous people.
In analyzing the effectiveness of those regulations, I have not been made aware of any specific deviation from the rules that you could attribute to ethnicity or cultural background. To make the assertion that you are making or to be able to verify the point that you are arguing, we would need a lot more careful statistical analysis.
Senator Wells: I want to make clear that the stats I referenced were from Stats Canada.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Welcome, minister, and welcome to your colleagues as well. Minister, an internal RCMP review recently reported significant backlogs in firearms seizures due to domestic violence or mental illness.
As the review notes, these delays put public safety at risk. It mentions two causes: First, the lack of timely access to medical information, which is the main cause of licence revocations or firearms seizures; and second, requests for confidential information from a third party, often police.
We know that medical information is highly confidential and that it can be very time-consuming for a third party to obtain. Yukon and British Columbia have a backlog of nearly 3,000 applications that have yet to be worked on by the RCMP. For Canada as a whole, what is the backlog for this kind of information request?
[English]
Mr. Goodale: Let me ask Mr. Mackinnon from the RCMP to respond to that.
Robert Mackinnon, Director, Firearms Business Improvement Directorate, Royal Canadian Mounted Police: The RCMP did an audit of their continuous eligibility framework. There were action items as a result that did focus on, as you spoke, the mental health regime and dealing with our clients affected by mental illness in getting certification from their physicians, in addition to some of our work-flow issues we have taken.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: That’s not what I was asking. In Yukon, in 2017, there was a backlog of nearly 3,000 applications. My question is, in Canada overall, how many applications to seize firearms have yet to be worked on by the RCMP? In order to seize firearms, authorities must have a medical report with a mental health diagnosis. These delays put public safety at risk. How much of a backlog is there for Canada as a whole?
[English]
Mr. Goodale: Senator, we don’t have those statistics at the table right now, but we will get them for you and provide you with the information.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: The RCMP has to get information from the medical system. A physician who testified two weeks ago told us it can take a very long time, up to five years, to make a decision about a person with mental health problems.
How will this bill facilitate communication between doctors and the police when it comes to getting firearms out of the hands of people with mental health problems?
[English]
Mr. Goodale: The legislation itself simply expands the scope of background checks.
The challenge you’re raising, Senator Boisvenu, is the administration of the new rules which will obviously get to the issue we were discussing earlier about service standards and the resourcing of the program to make sure that there are people in place with the right expertise and that there are systems in place.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Are there no additional resources for your department in the 2019 Budget to address the backlog?
[English]
Mr. Goodale: As I indicated in response to the earlier question, the issue in relation to the resourcing of the particular program is one that will be dealt with through the estimates process, providing funding to the RCMP to make sure they have the funds necessary to do the job they are being asked to do. We have the normal estimates process by which to provide that extra money.
The Chair: For the final question, minister, if you can do one more, will be from Senator Gold.
Senator Gold: My questions have been asked and your answers provided. Mindful of your time, minister, perhaps I would ask for the indulgence of chair to be able to ask a question of the staff after the minister departs for question period.
The Chair: Minister, we want to express our thanks on behalf of the committee for your appearance here today. I know staff will remain for the next hour. I am sure senators will have a series of questions for them.
Mr. Goodale: Thank you, Madam Chair. I wish the committee well in its deliberation on the legislation. You have a heavy agenda.
Senator Jaffer: My question is more to do with Aboriginal rights. We all know that for Aboriginal people hunting and fishing are very important.
On February 18, Ghislain Picard, Chief of the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador, appeared as a witness in front of the committee and said:
Obviously we need to keep firearms out of the hands of dangerous criminals and people with serious mental illnesses, but why punish a person who made a mistake decades ago?
Today I heard something different, that there is a way for Aboriginal people to get a licence. Did I hear that correctly? If so, why does the chief have these concerns? Maybe he is not aware. Could you elaborate on that?
Randall Koops, Director General, Policing Policy, Public Safety Canada: We always listen carefully to Chief Picard who speaks very thoughtfully on these issues.
What the minister was referring to is a means in the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada Adaptations Regulations that allows community members to verify that a person is in fact fit to own a firearm. Section 5 of the Firearms Act requires now that the Chief Firearms Officers take five years of a person’s life history into account in assessing the factors enumerated in the act for their eligibility to hold a firearms licence. Bill C-71 proposes that be changed to life.
There is nothing specific there that would differentiate the treatment of Indigenous persons from those of any other communities. The discretion remains with the Chief Firearms Officer to consider the circumstances under which an incident happened in someone’s life, the severity of the circumstances, the time that has elapsed, and whether on balance, given those considerations, the person represents a threat to public safety if they were to own a firearms licence.
Senator Jaffer: Is this for everybody?
Mr. Koops: It is for everybody, yes.
Senator Jaffer: It is not like a ban for life. Circumstances are considered. Am I correct?
Mr. Koops: Correct.
Senator Jaffer: For everybody circumstances are considered. If it was a long time ago when you were a young person and you are now 60 or 70, it doesn’t matter. Those things will be considered. Am I correct in saying that?
Mr. Koops: Correct. The act doesn’t say those things with certain exceptions related to certain types of criminal offences, but generally those factors are things that must be taken into account. They are not presented as things that by their presence would prevent you forever from having a firearms licence.
Senator Jaffer: The act doesn’t say that. That’s why there is this big concern. Besides the chief we have heard others ask, “Why punish somebody who has made a mistake when they were very young?” Will this be in the regulations?
Mr. Koops: That would not be included in the regulations since it already exists within section 5 of the Firearms Act itself.
Senator Jaffer: That is very useful.
My other question is what I asked the minister about. I have received many letters, as have all my colleagues, saying that you are punishing law-abiding citizens and asking why you are not going after the gangs or the criminals.
Would I be correct in saying that the gangs and criminals are covered in the Criminal Code? This is not about that. To me, these are six administrative things you are doing. This is not about going after law-abiding citizens. This is about clarifying and doing administrative things.
Could you clarify that for me, please?
Mr. Koops: Sure. It might also be helpful to point out to the committee that Budget 2018 announced a $327 million program over five years directed at fighting guns and gangs. One of the streams in that program is directed at interdicting the criminal use of firearms.
Obviously, for criminals who choose to trade in black market firearms or to smuggle firearms, the measures in Bill C-71 are not directed at them per se. The government is taking other measures, including funding to the RCMP, to the CBSA, and to all the provinces and territories that they can use within their jurisdictions as they see fit, to combat the growing criminal use of firearms in their jurisdictions.
Senator Jaffer: I am sure it is a public document. Would you be able to provide that information to the clerk, please?
Mr. Koops: Sure.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you so much.
Senator Gold: I have a two-part question for Ms. Paquette and Mr. Mackinnon.
With regard to the classification of firearms, could you talk a bit about the training and background of RCMP personnel charged with the task of classifying firearms and what credentials they have? Witnesses have never impugned their competence and credibility. Nonetheless, critics of the bill have argued that the current situation where cabinet could have a final say should be maintained.
The other question is: Why is there no appeal process from the RCMP classification decisions? Perhaps you could comment on both aspects of that.
Mr. Mackinnon: The RCMP Canadian Firearms Program utilizes the expertise in alignment with the definitions of the Criminal Code to classify a firearm, whether it be non-restricted, restricted or prohibited. They have extensive training and background in the field of applying it. Most of them have been doing it for many years. They are considered experts in the field of executing the Criminal Code to determine the classification of firearms.
Senator Gold: One of the witnesses that we heard from argued or complained that weapons otherwise indistinguishable functionally are classified one way or the other because of the way they happened to look. They mentioned as well that the decisions were made by individuals, so there would perhaps be a difference of opinion as between individual RCMP experts.
Is it true that just the look of a firearm could make the difference as to whether or not it’s prohibited, restricted or otherwise?
Mr. Mackinnon: I am not a technical expert in the classification of firearms certainly, but we do not base it on the look of the firearm. It’s the physical characteristics of the firearm that determine the classification. Whether it be a short-barrelled weapon, whether it have a barrel length less than or greater than 470 millimetres, or whether the firearm can be converted from a fully aut to a semi automatic, those are all elements the experts utilize to determine the classification of the firearm.
Senator Gold: What about the issue of the lack of an appeal from a classification decision?
Mr. Mackinnon: The firearm is subject to registration and the classification of the firearm does change. The individual has the right through the Registrar of Firearms to appeal the decision from a legal perspective.
Alexandra Budgell, Team Leader and Senior Counsel, Department of Justice Canada: Yes. Through the reference hearing process established in the Firearms Act, they have access to a provincial court judge on a reference hearing. Alternatively, if it’s a question of trade, it could be at the Canadian International Trade Tribunal. If it’s something at the border in terms of a classification, or obviously if the person is facing a criminal charge through the criminal court process, the judge ultimately will determine the classification in accordance with the criteria set out in the Criminal Code.
There is a number of different avenues by which somebody affected by classification can challenge that decision.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Mr. Mackinnon, how are you going to manage firearms on reserves? We know it can be difficult for the RCMP to conduct investigations on reserve land and that some firearms are sometimes moved through some reserves.
[English]
Mr. Mackinnon: Thank you for your question. The Chief Firearms Officers that have a focus with Indigenous clients do proactive outreach to ensure that Indigenous communities are aware of their roles and responsibilities in the care of firearms. The CFO of Manitoba has just completed an initiative whereby they have trained 88 instructors in Nunavut to deliver the safety training course to ensure clients are aware of the safe handling, transportation and use of firearms. Those are the proactive measures that the CFOs are executing.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: I wasn’t talking about Nunavut. I was talking about certain reserves that may be located in Ontario. Anyway, I’d like to go back to the issue of online access to authorizations to transport. Given the mitigated success of government online data systems and services — let’s not talk about Phoenix — can you tell us how long this bill has been in the works, what it does about online services, and at what point you think that service will be available?
[English]
Mr. Mackinnon: There is an implementation plan associated with Bill C-71 that will be solidified once the bill receives Royal Assent. Part of that is through online services for the authorizations to transport and, as Minister Goodale stated, resources to support the contact centre if you don’t have online access. We are in discussions with Public Safety Canada on an implementation plan to bring forth the service when that element comes into force. It will be operational online when the ATT changes are law.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: I don’t mean to cast doubt on your testimony, but coming up with an implementation plan and making sure it works are two different things. That’s what we’ve seen in other situations. There are implementation plans aplenty, but they don’t always work as well as one might hope. I can see that you trust the IT behind this even though it can seem questionable sometimes. Thank you very much, sir.
[English]
Senator Pratte: Regarding the new ATT regime, we have had witnesses appear before us who mentioned that because they are shooting in competition, for instance, they would need to go to the gunsmith regularly. Some collectors would go to all gun shows in their area.
In cases such as these my understanding is that the Chief Firearms Officer often issues an ATT for a period of time. For professional shooters, for instance, instead of having to issue a specific, single-use ATT each time a shooter goes to the gunsmith, they would issue a one-year or a five-year during the PAL period for them to go to the gunsmith because they often go.
Am I correct in assuming this? Is this the case?
Mr. Mackinnon: Yes, it is. Prior to the changes in 2015 where the transportation provisions became a condition of the licence, Chief Firearms Officers would issue them mostly for target practice. There were exceptions to the rule, especially if they knew the individual was a frequent participant as a repair business or gunsmith. There would be options for the CFOs to do that in the future. The change is just removing it as a condition of the licence, which is currently what it is.
Senator Pratte: For instance, a competitive shooter would not have to apply each time they wanted to go to a gunsmith. At least, it’s an option that the CFO has.
Mr. Mackinnon: It is discretionary upon each CFO to issue that.
Senator Pratte: I know the minister estimated in an answer the resources that would be needed for the RCMP and the CFOs to implement the bill. This is an ongoing process.
The impression of some is that with the issuance of reference numbers, the life-time background checks and the relatively new requirements regarding an ATT, will be extraordinarily burdensome. Obviously there will be delays and it will cost $2 billion like the former long-gun registry.
Without giving us the amount that will be necessary, could you give us an impression of how much of a burden these new requirements will be for the firearms program and Chief Firearms Officers?
Mr. Mackinnon: As Minister Goodale pointed out, the authorizations to transport that will continue to be a condition of a licence represent 96.5 per cent of authorizations to transport that were issued historically. We’re dealing with 3.5 per cent for the additional movement of firearms, whether you’re changing residence or whether you are going to a gun show.
Also, as Minister Goodale pointed out, the government is continually looking at ways to improve services to Canadians. We will introduce an online portal to apply for those. The burden on the RCMP Canadian Firearms Program should be minimal with respect to the authorizations to transport.
With respect to licence verification, I do not think it was previously mentioned but there will be online portals that will allow businesses and individuals to do the verification of the transferee of a firearm. It is actually currently up and running for businesses as part of section 23 of the Firearms Act, which is optional. We don’t issue reference numbers as a result, so that will be a change.
When there was a registration requirement for non-restricted firearms pre-2012, a great deal of our transactions were online. Something like 65 per cent of the stuff we were doing between businesses and individuals was actually online as opposed to a call centre transaction or a paper process.
We have identified resources to support licence verification and authorization to transport. We’re doing everything we can to mitigate the additional resources required by looking at the processes and how we service Canadians.
Senator Pratte: How about the background checks?
Mr. Mackinnon: It is the same kind of concept as Minister Goodale pointed out. We are currently assessing the impact of a life-time review on certain elements with respect to our client base. We will come up with a figure of resources over and above what current Chief Firearms Officers do from an eligibility perspective. We don’t want to deter from what they are currently doing from a public safety perspective.
We are also taking into account changes to our process model that make it more efficient for us to handle these files, which may augment the amount of resources we need without minimizing what we’re doing with respect to public safety.
Senator Pratte: Thank you.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Thank you for your answers. I have two questions, one for Mr. Mackinnon and the other for Mr. Koops.
Mr. Mackinnon, earlier you talked about delays related to RCMP information gathering in places like British Columbia because of the rule requiring physicians to do background checks going back five years. Now they will have to do a lifetime background check.
It seems likely the delays will get even longer because the medical records searches will be much longer, not to mention the fact that people move, change doctors and change psychiatrists. Consultations will therefore have to involve several doctors at once. Do you have data for each province about those delays currently? Can you predict how a switch from the five-year timeframe to lifetime timeframe will affect background checks? Have you figured out what kind of impact that will have on research?
[English]
Mr. Mackinnon: Thank you for your question.
As I spoke earlier, I do not have a breakdown by province on where CFO is looking for information from a mental health perspective to assist in the investigation. As we will take away an action item from the previous request, we will look into that.
We are reliant, obviously, on the medical community in certain cases where we learn of a medical illness with respect to a client. We are constantly looking at the processes and how we can better them and expedite the information back to the CFO about the client so the CFO can determine the eligibility.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: I get that, but that wasn’t my question. Let me rephrase it. Right now, we have five-year checks, and it’s likely that a person will be treated by a single doctor during that time and that reports of domestic violence will be relatively easy to find in the system. If background checks have to cover an individual’s lifetime, that individual will probably have had several different doctors, and domestic violence incidents might go back 30 or 40 years. Have you assessed the impact of delays related to doing that research?
[English]
Kellie Paquette, Director General, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police: It will be based on the information available to us. On your question around an individual having five different doctors throughout their life history, questions are asked about their medical history. Currently, it says within the last five years. If this bill were to go through it would include the life history, so it would be upon the individual to identify that.
In addition, we have access to information that goes beyond the five years that can now be taken into consideration when eligibility is in question.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: It seems to me that the likelihood of errors or incorrect information will be much greater because individuals will have to provide information about their entire lives. The information is very likely to be much less reliable.
Mr. Koops, last autumn’s report by the Office of the Auditor General revealed something worrisome: Canada’s recidivism rates, which Statistics Canada publishes in Juristat, do not take into consideration people sentenced to less than two years. Do you have data about the recidivism and reincarceration rates for people sentenced to less than two years for a crime involving a firearm?
Mr. Koops: Unfortunately, I am not very familiar with that report. We can check with the department to see if we have that data.
Senator Boisvenu: It would be interesting to see data that includes people sentenced to less than two years who are not accounted for in the crime statistics. I would like to see a report on recidivism rates that includes people sentenced to less than two years and more than two years. Right now, we have only a partial picture of recidivism rates among offenders who have committed a crime involving a firearm.
Mr. Koops: We will follow up.
[English]
Senator McIntyre: Under the proposed measures in Bill C-71, conditions will now be attached to business licences requiring businesses to transmit recorded information to a prescribed official if they cease to operate. The idea is to avoid any potential privacy breaches.
Are privacy safeguards and accountability measures provided in the bill?
Mr. Koops: They’re not provided in Bill C-71 because they are already part and parcel of the Privacy Act protections associated with personal information collected in the administration of a government program.
In the case where records are under the control of businesses, in certain circumstances they may also be subject to their own provincial legislation governing the use and collection of personal information by businesses within the province.
Senator McIntyre: As I read it, businesses may be required to purchase new software to meet the new diligence record-keeping requirements imposed by Bill C-71. There is that possibility.
Mr. Koops: The bill as presented to you, senator, doesn’t specify the form or manner in which businesses would be required to keep those records. They could perhaps be kept by a business that chose to do so in the form of a paper ledger, which was the form in use for many years prior to the current regime.
Some large retailers might choose to do that as part of the client management software they associate with the files of their customers, but the bill itself does not specify how that information would have to be stored.
Senator McIntyre: My next question is for Ms. Budgell. It is a question on the issue of the business records of firearms businesses and the involvement of either the CFO or the courts surrounding warrants.
As I understand it, there is a distinction between the regulatory power of the CFO to enter a business to investigate and to ensure that records are being kept properly. If kept, no problem; that’s the end of the matter. If not kept, either the business or the person could be subject to prosecution under section 101 of the Firearms Act.
That said, if in the course of reviewing those records the CFO comes across evidence or suspected evidence, the Crown and the police could seek judicial authorization to seize the business records; in other words, obtain a warrant. Am I correct in my assessment?
Ms. Budgell: Yes, in the sense that they are two different frameworks. The inspection powers included in the Firearms Act are for firearms officers to inspect business records.
Senator McIntyre: The powers of the CFO and the courts.
Ms. Budgell: That is for regulatory compliance to ensure that the businesses are meeting the conditions of their licence and that they are in regulatory compliance.
The moment that it becomes a law enforcement investigation, a criminal investigation, the criminal rules apply. Those usually include more stringent standards which can include judicial authorization and production orders as appropriate.
Senator McIntyre: Bill C-71 does not provide any additional investigative powers to law enforcement officials.
Ms. Budgell: Correct. There are no special powers in Bill C-71 for law enforcement.
Senator Griffin: Coming back to the authority to transport, the minister mentioned that there were 4,500 gunsmiths in Canada. He didn’t reference how many gun ranges, but he said the ranges were much easier for the RCMP to keep track of.
Knowing that, what is your estimate of the number of gun ranges in Canada?
Mr. Mackinnon: I don’t have the figure in front of me, but I believe it is between 1,200 and 1,300 across Canada.
Senator Griffin: I suppose ATTs are a lot like going to get winter tires changed in the spring. I make an appointment with the local dealer. I think it should be relatively easy to put in a requirement in the regulations. It does not have to be in the legislation. Then someone taking their firearm to the gunsmith who has a confirmed appointment has documentation. It’s probably a lot easier to keep track of that than it is whether or not they’re coming from a range.
That is a small item. It is not to die on but is just a convenience.
When I asked about mitigation of losses for retail operators, basically the answer the minister gave me applied to the two types of firearms the cabinet had permitted previously that will not be permitted any longer. That there was a grandfathering period, I understand that.
Looking ahead, if the RCMP deems a formerly restricted weapon to be prohibited, has there been any discussion as to what mitigation there will be for firearms retail operators that may have stock in their stores? They could have quite a lot of money tied up.
Mr. Mackinnon: Yes. On the approach taken to the classification of the change or classification of a firearm, the RCMP fully understands how it could impact a commercial entity. Information is provided on how they could deal with that if they were not allowed to keep the firearms as a result of the classification. Each situation is taken on a case-by-case basis.
In the case of the two listed firearms that in Bill C-71, the CZ858 and the Swiss Arms, there were proactive measures, as Mr. Goodale said, to advise the business community that there was a possession date of June 30, 2018. That was a requirement.
I don’t want to say advanced warnings, but there are measures to be taken to advise the business community, in addition to the individual community, about proposed legislation on the books to be brought into force.
Senator Griffin: We will wait to see how it pans out in the long run. Potentially there could be a lot of money tied up. These are private retailers that have bought firearms in good faith. It may be a case of their having a very large commitment.
When changes are made, there has to be a very able effort at mitigating the losses of legitimate business owners.
Senator McPhedran: I seem to be developing today a bit of a theme around scope. In my initial question I would like to address the Criminal Code and to pick up on your explanation, Ms. Budgell.
As I read the bill, right now we have a situation where it’s not possible for an officer to conduct a search for documents related to the ownership of a firearm. I am picking up on the present and past tense wording in subsection 117.02 of the Criminal Code.
My concern comes partly out of the fact that I also have rural roots. I have had situations in my personal experience of domestic violence in a rural setting.
The way in which I read the current bill, if there is an imminent crime or imminent domestic violence in process and being able to access a warrant becomes necessary, particularly in rural areas, the obtaining of a warrant to act quickly seems to be almost impossible under a combination of the bill and the code.
I hope I am wrong. If I am correct, then I go to my question about a possible amendment.
Ms. Budgell: I want to make sure I understand your question. The bill does not address search and seizure powers for police. Under section 117 or thereabouts of the Criminal Code right now there are a number of search and seizure provisions that address when law enforcement can go into a home or a place and seize firearms.
There are some where a warrant is required in advance. There are those where a warrant is not required exception in exceptional circumstances.
Those provisions are fairly comprehensive in terms of police ability where there is either an offence or where there is a concern on public safety grounds to seize a firearm.
Senator McPhedran: In terms of where there is a firearms offence in process or reason to believe it has occurred, I am partly concerned about the reference to telewarrants. I am trying to understand one hypothetical in a rural or isolated setting where proximity by police to get to the site is affected.
Was attention paid to a scenario like this and the relative difficulty of obtaining a warrant? Could you explain whether a telewarrant becomes more readily accessible in a situation like this one? What exists now that addresses these situations in domestic violence where rapid response and presence are absolutely essential?
Ms. Budgell: I will ask my colleague, our Criminal Code expert, to provide assistance as well.
We need to differentiate between situations where there is a warrant and perhaps there are circumstances where a warrant may not be required because of exigent circumstances.
Phaedra Glushek, Director and General Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice Canada: I could give a very brief summary of some applicable warrant powers in the Criminal Code. There are several provisions.
I am going to go from memory here because I don’t have my code, but subsection 487.11 is an existing warrant power that allows for warrant searches. It also includes telewarrants, so rapid responses for when a warrant can be sought and can be issued.
In the firearms regime there is also subsection 117.02 in Part III of the Criminal Code to which you referred, senator, for both warrant searches and warrant list searches in certain circumstances. It’s a lower standard in that section and subsection that allows for warrantless searches in very limited circumstances where there is an offence occurring or has just occurred. There is a very tight regime around the Firearms Act.
I am sure the Senate committee is familiar with the common law abilities to have warrantless searches in exigent or urgent circumstances. I will not impute any bad faith on any business, but an urgent circumstance in this case would be when a business is going to destroy records, for example. That would allow someone to go into the business without a warrant. That is a common law power the police have.
There are three circumstances. It’s a scaling of different times of warrants. In a nutshell, those are the types of warrants that can be applied. There are some instances where it is urgent and you can get one by telewarrant, where it is urgent and you can use the common law power, but there are very narrow circumstances where it is very urgent to be able to go into the business without a warrant.
Senator McPhedran: Perhaps I may clarify my question a bit. Would it be reasonable to conclude from this information that a situation of domestic violence being imminent and/or in process would qualify very clearly as coming within those exigent circumstances?
Ms. Glushek: The facts of each case have to be looked at on a case-by-case basis. There definitely could be a situation where the person is known to the police or they know that there’s a firearm in the property and where they could use an exigent circumstance to enter the home or dwelling.
Senator McPhedran: I don’t know whether the director general or the director of the RCMP might have anything to add from practical experience in the field, for example.
Mr. Mackinnon: No, I have nothing to add to what you’ve already been provided by legal.
Senator McPhedran: Then my question becomes specific to this bill. Is there in fact a need for at least a clarifying amendment in relation to capacity where there is an imminent risk of loss, destruction of evidence or concern for the safety of individuals and/or police in this bill with reference to firearms or anything more specific?
Ms. Glushek: With respect to this bill I would say that there is a current regime that allows for most circumstances, whether it’s with a warrant or without a warrant or in common law cases that covers a gamut.
I can’t speak to the policy of the act or whether or not it should be amended, but I can say that there is a comprehensive regime in terms of warrants and telewarrants to cover situations such as domestic violence.
Senator McIntyre: Current subsection 23.1 of the Firearms Act states that a transferor is authorized to transfer non-restricted firearms if he or she has no reason to believe that the transferee is not authorized to acquire and possess a non-restricted firearm.
Bill C-71 would repeal current subsection 23.1 of the Firearms Act in its entirety, including subsection 23.1(2), which states:
. . . neither the Registrar or his or her delegate nor a designated person shall retain any record of a request made under subsection (1).
My question is: Who is designated as the Registrar of Firearms and under what authority is this designation made?
Mr. Mackinnon: The Registrar of Firearms, and I am looking for support here, is appointed either through the Commissioner of Firearms or the Minister of Public Safety. I don’t know the legal vehicle, but the Registrar of Firearms would be responsible for collecting the information associated with the licence verification of the transferee with respect to the elements listed in Bill C-71.
The Registrar of Firearms is currently an RCMP employee that reports to the director general as well as to the Commissioner of Firearms who happens to be the Commissioner of the RCMP.
Senator McIntyre: I have a final question on that issue for Mr. Mackinnon. Will the registrar be allowed to retain a record of a request for a transfer of a non-restricted firearm between individuals?
Mr. Mackinnon: Yes. As per Bill C-71, the registrar will collect the licence number of the transfer or the licence number of the transferee, the date and the reference number issued. There will be no details of the firearm involved and collected with respect to the actual transaction.
Senator Pratte: Some concern has been expressed on a possible link between the records the government will keep of reference numbers associated with PALs and other possible sources of information that would allow linkage of information as far as reference numbers are concerned and the firearms.
Is such linkage possible, or will this database be independent and isolated from other databases?
Mr. Mackinnon: As I spoke, there will be no information collected on any firearm with respect to the transaction. The four data elements listed within Bill C-71 will be isolated and that’s what will be collected by the Registrar of Firearms.
There will be an interface with the licensing database to confirm the validity of the person buying the firearm because that is the intent of the bill, but the information will be in isolation.
The Chair: On behalf of all senators on the committee, I express our thanks to you for helping us clarify a very technical bill.
For our final panel today, we welcome from Calibre- The Canadian Firearm Magazine, Daniel Fritter; by video conference, Edward Burlew, Barrister and Solicitor; and from The Sporting Clubs of Niagara, Gerry Gamble, President.
Mr. Fritter, the floor is yours to make an opening statement.
Daniel Fritter, Publisher, Calibre, - The Canadian Firearm Magazine: I am the owner and publisher of Calibre magazine, Canada’s most widely read firearms publication with roughly one million readers annually. I started Calibre seven years ago and have been covering and reporting on the gun debate in Canada ever since. I am honoured to be able to speak here in front of you today.
I will be blunt. Bill C-71 will not accomplish its stated goals of increasing public safety, and I do not support any component of this bill. However, it is my understanding that this government did arrive in office with a mandate to roll back Bill C-42, and this is largely what Bill C-71 was created to do.
Just as Bill C-42 did not represent a significant threat to Canadian safety, neither does Bill C-71 represent a significant step toward a safer Canada. On the contrary, it is my opinion that the components of this bill, as they are written, represent a significant risk to public safety due to both the cost of implementing the bill and the complete lack of limitations placed on government and RCMP with regard to fulfilling the bill’s legal requirements.
First and foremost, I ask the committee to reconsider the as yet unlimited requirement that retailers retain records of firearms purchases.
The Chair: Mr. Fritter, could I ask you to slow down for the purpose of translation?
Mr. Fritter: As it is written, the law requires that retailers record the details of the firearms purchased as well as the purchaser’s licence number and keeps said records for 20 years.
As Mr. Caruana typified in a previous sitting of this committee, this essentially creates a decentralized gun registry, one that is all but useless to law enforcement due to the lack of centralized access to the data as well as the protections placed on the data by Bill C-71 itself, all while burdening retailers with the cost of maintaining and securing this registry.
I am not a retailer, and I won’t waste the committee’s time by saying what the retailers’ issues could be. However, I am a gun owner and any time my information is being recorded by private industry at the government’s behest, especially regarding the purchase and possession of things as appealing to the criminal element as firearms, it is my opinion that the government has a responsibility to all Canadians to ensure the ability of these private enterprises to collect data is both limited in scope and that the data is protected by law.
Bill C-71 provides no such legal limitations nor protections on this data. As such, it is all but guaranteed that some firearms retailers will collect more data than Bill C-71 requires, such as names and addresses for any number of reasons.
The creation of such a database represents a significant security risk. If such a list were obtained by a criminal element, it would provide them with a veritable shopping list of firearms and the addresses they could be found at. Short of stationing a police officer outside every gun owner’s door, there is literally nothing the police could do to secure the firearms in question and ensure the safety of the owners that possessed them.
In today’s modern world where criminal gangs have greater access to hackers and data miners than many local gun shops have to secure data storage, the government must limit the potential risk to gun owners and the public at large by amending the section of Bill C-71 to prohibit the collection of additional personal information pursuant to the sale of a firearm and to provide legal guidelines for the security of said data.
Likewise, my second issue with Bill C-71 also relates to the collection of data, specifically that around the sale of non-restricted firearms and the new verification system Bill C-71 looks to implement.
First, it is largely unenforceable for private sales. If someone sells an unrestricted firearm to another private individual, short of a sting operation, they generally cannot get a conviction.
Second, like my previous issue regarding retailer registries, this amounts to a massive data collection campaign on the part of the government without limitation. As it is written, the bill outlines the process that individuals must follow but does not provide the government with any limitation on the data that must be provided for a gun owner to acquire the reference number issued by the firearms centre. As we recently learned, this data could very well be used for purposes beyond the scope of Bill C-71.
As a new member of the Canadian Firearms Advisory Committee has already said, the committee’s first meeting was spent discussing the potential changes to firearms storage regulations that may come as a result of Bill C-71. Obviously, since Bill C-71 does not include any references to the storage of firearms, we can only surmise that any storage changes that may come as a result of Bill C-71, as the committee member stated, will lean upon Bill C-71’s data collection components.
My largest issue with this specific section is the cost. As of 2012, the last year for which we have long-gun data in Canada, there were approximately seven million non-restricted guns registered in Canada and roughly 500,000 restricted guns. Now there are a million restricted firearms in Canada. If the ownership trend seen in 2011-12 continues, it is reasonable to assume there is somewhere north of 14 million non-restricted firearms in Canada, especially since the seven million originally registered only amounted to roughly half those imported during the long-gun registry period.
Thus, the requirement that non-restricted firearm transfers now be approved through the firearms centre conservatively represents a fourteenfold increase in the workload for the firearms centre. Add to that the additional requirements that owners obtain authorization to transport they previously did not require, and it is feasible to say the firearms centre’s budget will have to be increased by at least 15 times in order to maintain a service standard that anecdotally perpetually seems to involve higher than expected call volumes and anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes on hold.
To put all this into perspective, the firearms program’s 2016-17 budget earmarked just under $12 million for the central processing site which I expect to see increased to $180 million annually to satisfy the workload that Bill C-71 will place on the firearms program. That is a conservative estimate.
Given the firearms program recently announced they literally cannot afford to test firearms unless they were actually used and fired in the commission of a crime, to pass a law that would require the government to allocate such vast resources to a call centre with a clientele limited to those of us that go through a daily background check seems ill advised.
Hence, it is my opinion that this section of Bill C-71 be significantly amended to impose limits on the data collection by the government, as well as to reduce the fiscal strain the bill poses as it is worded.
Finally, I would ask the committee to re-evaluate the imposition of unlimited background checks for any new PAL applications for similar reasons to those outlined previously. This section, perhaps more than any other, represents a significant departure from Canadian values and ideals.
Although I am not a lawyer and cannot speak specifically to the legality of such matters, it is my understanding that Canadian are protected from unreasonable searches by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Applying for a firearms licence should not be grounds for our national police service to have carte blanche to peer into Canadian lives both on and off line.
To put this in perspective, criminal search warrants often have greater limitations on them than the PAL applications will be subjected to under Bill C-71.
Beyond the matters of privacy and security, as with all the other points I’ve raised, there is the matter of the cost of conducting limitless background checks.
Add this cost to that of maintaining service standards for the new non-restricted transfer verification process and the equally new requirement for gun owners to apply for more ATTs, and we may see Canada’s firearms program budget go from roughly $54 million to over $250 million annually.
That is a large line item on a law enforcement budget for a service whose clientele is limited to two million Canadians who have already proven themselves non-violent, law-abiding Canadians who go through daily record checks.
As a result, I ask the Senate to consider amending Bill C-71 to remove this component.
These comments are not by any stretch an exhaustive list of issues that I have with this bill. Given enough time, I have no doubt I could bore everyone in this room to tears with my opinion on the government’s abdication of their responsibility for the removal of all oversight over the RCMP’s classification system, the creation of new prohibited classes of firearms and just about every other component of this bill.
In my opinion, Bill C-71 was a hurriedly drafted piece of legislation aimed at following through on the government’s promise to rescind Bill C-42. I strongly urge this committee to evaluate this bill, not as the government has marketed it as a buttress against attacks like those we saw in New Zealand last week but rather at face value.
Thank you for your time. I hope I can answer any questions you might have to your satisfaction.
Edward Burlew, Barrister and Solicitor, as an individual: So that committee members may be aware, I have been practising law for 40 years. I am a graduate of Osgoode Hall Law School. For the last 21 years, I have specialized in firearms law and in representing licensed owners of firearms. No gang members; that’s gone. I don’t do them. I have appeared in over 700 cases in that time period. I have had great success with that. Within those 700 cases, I have done many appeals on firearms licence references and prohibition applications, both attendant to sentencing and on their own under the provisions of section 117 of the Criminal Code.
That brings me to the point that I am addressing, which is the removal of the five-year limitation set out in subsection 5(2) of the Firearms Act.
The Firearms Act as it presently stands uses the following words in subsection 5(1) about eligibility to hold a licence:
. . . if it is desirable, in the interests of the safety of that or any other person, that the person not possess a firearm, a cross-bow, a prohibited weapon, a restricted weapon, . . . ammunition . . . .
That is the same wording we find in the Criminal Code where there is a discretionary prohibition order requested or to be reviewed upon a finding of guilt. Subsection 110(1) says that the court must:
. . . consider whether it is desirable, in the interests of the safety of the person or of any other person, to make an order prohibiting the person from possessing any firearm, cross-bow, prohibited weapon, . . . .
As well, section 111 of the Criminal Code is a preventative prohibition order which says that a peace officer, firearms officer or other officer may apply to a provincial court to prohibit a person from even touching the following items being, as we said,
. . . firearm, cross-bow, prohibited weapon, restricted weapon, prohibited device, ammunition, prohibited ammunition or explosive substance, . . . .
Such as gun powder. It continues:
. . . where it is not desirable, in the interests of the safety of the person against whom the order is sought or any other person.
The same applies where a person has their firearms seized. That’s found in subsection 117.04 of the Criminal Code. It says the same thing and uses the words, “not desirable in the interests of the safety of the person or any other person for the person to possess weapon, firearms,” et cetera.
Why is this significant? The court, including the courts of appeal, all the provinces and territories, has brought into precedent the principle that the standard to be applied for a prohibition order is the present state of the respondent to the application or the person found guilty. The court will look at their present state. That is what is most important.
In my doing these matters I have had people who have had problems. That’s how the prohibition order started. That’s how the assault charge started. With respect to that, at the time of the sentencing or at the time of the hearing for a prohibition, the court looks at them at that date.
Very often we go through quite a process as defence counsel in rehabilitating that person. The judges, the Crown attorneys and police double-check what we have done and double-check the person. If they are satisfied that they have been rehabilitated at the time of the hearing, no prohibition is imposed.
However, subsection 5(2), with the removal of the words “within the previous five years,” goes against that legal precedent. It says that the Chief Firearms Office, which means that it’s delegated down to an area firearms officer, will be mandated to go back right to the beginning. It says, “Shall have regard.” That’s a mandate.
What does that mean? It means people who are 50 years old have had their licences renewed four times since 1998. They have had those firearms licences for 20 years. Perhaps when they were 18 they got into a fight and were sentenced. Maybe they got a fine. Maybe they plead guilty. Maybe they did a day in jail. That now becomes relevant. With no guidance given to the CFO or the AFO with respect to rehabilitation, nothing is given to them.
Rehabilitation is very important, and it is totally ignored by the removal of the five-year wording. In fact, under the immigration law there is a 28-page guidance as to how a person who may have had a criminal record can be rehabilitated to be able to apply to become a landed immigrant.
The same thing applies in sentencing. It is called a risk assessment but is not referenced anywhere in the Firearms Act. The area firearms office is totally at sea without any guidance.
I am talking about Ontario and other Western provinces where I practise law. I am presently finding this out because the police, for the most part, are looking beyond the five years right now. They are assessing this and trying to figure it out. In fact, where people may have been checked out by a court, a Crown attorney or a prior area firearms officer and approved for a licence, they are now getting re-reviewed with no thought of how their rehabilitation has been.
People who have had their firearms for at least five years, and in some instances many years more than that with renewals, have clearly proven their rehabilitative state.
Why must police go back and get records that are decades old? They are not able to find the witnesses. They are not able to get the true facts. I am not just being anecdotal. This goes on.
A person who is actually a barrister was reported to have an issue in high school. The police investigated and said, “Well, it’s not really an issue.” Yet that is now being concentrated on by an area firearms officer. That is more than 15 years old.
This needs to be revisited. At first blush it sounds like a great idea, but in practice it will not work because there is no guidance given to area firearms officers. There is no way that they are told that they have to follow the prohibition precedent.
I have given a paper on this to be distributed to the committee. I don’t know if it has been distributed. I have outlined in it how the prohibition order is far more reaching in prevention than just being denied a firearms licence. That all has to be looked at.
This is a serious issue because we are then wasting police resources. We are revisiting things that have already been decided. We don’t have the guidance to do this.
I can see the thoughtfulness of wanting to do this, but I am talking about the practicality. I am talking about the court precedent using the same words. If that has to be done by taking multiple cases to the court when a person is rejected for the firearms licence, that may be the cause which is not needed.
The Chair: I wonder if you might wrap up.
Mr. Burlew: I was just wrapping up.
I would like this to be reconsidered. I think that within five years should remain because the practicality of it is there.
I thank you for your time and await any questions.
Gerry Gamble, President, The Sporting Clubs of Niagara: The Sporting Clubs of Niagara is a grassroots, pro-firearm political action organization representing approximately 7,000 households in the Niagara Peninsula. I am also on the executive committee of two Niagara area gun clubs and a vice-president of the Canadian Shooting Sports Association. For seven years — from 2006 to 2013 — I served as a member of the federal government’s Canadian Firearms Advisory Committee.
I appear today to speak specifically about the effects of Bill C-71 on legal firearm users and from the perspective of shooting ranges and clubs.
Prior to the 2015 election, Prime Minister Trudeau stated:
We’ll make policy based on facts, not facts based on policy.
This bill fails to meet that standard. It is legislation based not on facts but on unsubstantiated assumptions, semi-informed anecdotal observations and hypotheticals which can only lead to it failing to achieve its stated goal, which is to institute:
. . . common-sense measures that will crack down on illegal handguns and assault weapons, creating safer communities.
The following are items which negatively affect gun clubs and their members while at the same time failing to meet the above-stated premise of the bill.
First is the removal of authorizations to transport or ATTs presently attached to the holder’s possession and acquisition licence.
Currently the following six conditions for restricted and prohibited firearms are attached to a PAL: to approve shooting ranges; to a peace officer, et cetera, for verification, registration or disposal; to a licensed repair business; to a gun show; to a port of exit or entry; and from the place of acquisition to the licence holder’s dwelling.
Bill C-71 removes from the PAL the transport conditions for all except numbers one through six. It requires the owner to apply for specific ATTs for numbers two through five.
Little evidence exists that the current ATT system is being abused or that there are no controls on the transport of these firearms. Firearm owners must still meet the transport conditions stipulated in the Firearms Act. They are not holding up the corner store on the way to the gunsmith or robbing a bank en route to a gun show. Any assertions to that effect are at best misleading and at worst patently false.
An Access to Information request by Dennis Young, who previously appeared before this committee, found that from 2008 to 2017 nearly one million ATTs were issued. Only 471, which is 0.047 per cent, were revoked. Most of those were because the possessor no longer belonged to a gun club, thus negating the need for an ATT.
Does the RCMP think there is an abuse of ATTs? Mr. Young’s ATI indicates that the Canadian Firearms Program has no record of arrests or charges for the number of persons charged with a criminal offence while failing to have a valid authorization to transport firearms, and no record of the total number of licensed firearm owners that were charged with a criminal offence while failing to have a valid authorization to transport.
This is not surprising. Licensed firearm owners are not transporting their guns for the purpose of committing crimes and criminals never bother to get ATTs.
The requirement mandated in Bill C-71 to obtain individual ATTs for reasons two through five is simply a money wasting and time wasting exercise that does nothing to mitigate the criminal use of firearms while diverting scarce law enforcement resources from real crime prevention.
Second is the prohibition of CZ858 and Swiss Arms rifles. This bill immediately reclassifies an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 legally purchased and owned non-restricted and restricted rifles as prohibited. It gives the RCMP greater leeway to reclassify and prohibit any firearm with no substantial oversight as to the veracity of their reclassification.
These are not common crime guns. They are expensive rifles at $1,500 to $4,000 each. They are widely used for both target shooting and hunting and are no more unique or dangerous than the thousands of other non-restricted firearms that exist in Canada.
The RCMP has produced no evidence to the contrary. If they present a danger to public safety, one must question why the RCMP initially saw fit to classify both of them as non-restricted, the most innocuous of the three Canadian classes of firearms.
Has the application of Canadian law sunk to such a depth that honest, lawful Canadians can have their property confiscated without even the courtesy of a valid reason?
This confiscation without compensation is what one would expect to take place in North Korea or Cuba, not in Canada. Despite the government’s rhetoric, it is confiscation as these firearms will be seized without compensation upon the death of the owner.
Third is licence verification for transfers. Bill C-71 requires that all non-restricted firearm transfers will require a reference number before the transfer can occur. As with the revised ATTs, this seems to be the answer to a question no one asked. Statistically, the firearms of choice for criminals are handguns, despite the fact that their legal transfer in Canada has been tightly regulated since 1934.
Let’s be clear. It is rare when a licensed firearm owner provides a firearm to someone who shouldn’t have it. If they do, legislation is in place to lay appropriate charges.
The best information I have is that there have only been a total of 24 prosecutions, not convictions, for straw purchases, which are licensed individuals purchasing firearms for non-licensed individuals. This is in the history of Canada.
Surely the government doesn’t really believe that another data system to optimistically prevent one or two illegal transactions per year is getting the best value for dollar in terms of crime prevention.
In August 2018, CBC News contacted the Canadian Firearms Program regarding domestically sourced firearms used in crimes. The response from the RCMP was:
Currently, there is no national repository for this type of information in Canada. The Canadian Firearms Program does not collect or track national statistics with regard to the origin of crime guns . . . no such data exists.
Lynn Barr-Telford, Director General of Health, Justice and Special Surveys at Statistics Canada, stated:
We don’t know the origin of firearms involved in gun crime in Canada.
If, as the government claims, domestically sourced firearms are the problem, why does the RCMP not keep statistics on such occurrences? The answer seems obvious. It is so rare that it is not a problem.
In conclusion, since the vast majority of this bill only affects licensed firearm owners and legal firearms, it is a fallacy to accept that it can, as written, in any meaningful way alleviate the criminal misuse of firearms.
In a March 2018 press release, Public Safety Minister Goodale stated that Bill C-71 would be “reasonable and respectful toward law-abiding firearms owners.”
In light of that statement, I pose to you the following questions: Is it reasonable and respectful to confiscate legally owned property without compensation? Is it reasonable and respectful to mandate additional paperwork, which evidence shows has no effect on the criminal use of firearms? I submit to you that the answer to all these questions is an unqualified no.
If the solution to preventing the criminal use of firearms was to focus on legal gun owners, the problem should have been solved in 1977 under Bill C-51, in 1991 under Bill C-17, and in 1995 under Bill C-68. Yet, 42 years later we are trying to solve the same problems using the same failed logic.
If this bill passes in its current form, I assure you that in a very few years we will be back here again still vainly searching for answers as to why gun crime is not declining.
I ask you to take the opportunity to reject this legislation in its present form and to avoid the mistake of once again focusing on law-abiding, licence holding Canadians in an ill-directed effort to solve the problem of the criminal misuse of firearms.
I thank you for your time and consideration. I will be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: I thank our guests for being here. My first question is for Mr. Fritter.
Mr. Fritter, supporters of the bill categorically deny that Bill C-71 will create a new gun registry. They say the bill’s preamble supports their argument. Right off the top, you said it is a thinly disguised gun registry. Can you justify that statement?
[English]
Mr. Fritter: There are a few components here. There is obviously the verification process of long guns through the sale of those. They will have to transfer them in a manner similar to having the transfer restricted.
I don’t think that constitutes a long-gun registry of any sort. However it does provide a registry of the number of guns I own. For example, if I buy five and sell three, therefore the government has some record of the fact that I have whatever is left. I forget what my two numbers are because I am nervous about this.
The second component is the retailer component, which is not a long-gun registry, again, but could be one if the bill isn’t amended to limit the information that can be entered in those purchases.
If a store wants to take someone’s name and address for customer management and whatnot that’s fine, but specifically with regard to the sale of firearms it has to be amended to say that they can only collect the PAL number and the type of firearm because that information will provide no value.
I think it’s also crucial to point out, as I mentioned in my speech, that there is no component within Bill C-71 or the existing Firearms Act that prevents a retailer from distributing this list. If a disgruntled employee takes 10 years of firearms sales records and sells them to a gangbanger for a large sum of money, that’s not even illegal and that’s a huge security risk once that genie leaves the bottle.
As one who owns guns legitimately, if my local gun store’s list it sold, that’s it. It never comes back. I have to move, I guess. That’s the only conclusion I can think of. Otherwise I am living in a house where there is a list floating around that says this guy has guns. That’s a very uncomfortable situation to be in.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: My next question is for Mr. Burlew.
Mr. Fritter talked about the heavy burden Bill C-71 would impose. There will be registration certificates, background checks and retailers keeping a record of purchases. However, Indigenous lands, where there are lots of firearms and illegal weapons, are a bit of a grey zone.
As a lawyer, do you believe that, for people who want to feel safer, this bill creates a false sense of security even as it gives police officers, retailers, hunters and farmers more responsibilities? Briefly, do you think this bill can be enforced consistently all across Canada?
[English]
Mr. Burlew: In response to the situation of Indigenous owners of firearms, we have to reflect on the fact that in the past the police are alleged to have acted unfairly with respect to Indigenous people. Indigenous people have an unexplained or unfair high number of police incidents.
I think that will be a big problem if we go back more than five years. We’ll see that many Indigenous hunters, because they have to license their guns to do their subsistence hunting and to enjoy their lifestyle, their rights and their culture.
By going back more than five years, I can only see that they will be reinvestigated and burdened with matters that they have overcome, whether it is drugs, violence, depression or something of that nature. They will find that their lives now, many decades later, are revisited with the problems they and their communities have worked so hard to eliminate.
This may actually lead to Bill C-71 being called the Indigenous peoples disarmament act, and I don’t use that word lightly.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: My last question is for Mr. Gamble. I’m sure you heard the Minister of Public Safety, Mr. Goodale, earlier today. What do you think of what he said to reassure owners who have to transport their firearms as, he says, they used to do? What do you think of those permits being available online?
[English]
Mr. Gamble: I didn’t hear the minister speak today, but I will relate my experience in trying to transfer firearms now. If I try to transfer a restricted firearm now in Ontario, it is quite common for me to wait four to six weeks for a transfer to go through.
We all know how well promises work regarding data systems. The Phoenix pay system is a pretty good example of how well data systems work.
To give you an idea, the Sporting Clubs of Niagara runs four gun shows a year. At our gun shows, people buy and sell guns. The gun shows are on Friday night. When the firearms registry was in place, it closed at five o’clock on Friday and did not open again until Monday morning. Therefore no transfers could be done at the gun show. People would drive 50 or 60 miles to get to a gun show and say, “I would like to buy that firearm,” and the vendor would have to say, “You will have to come back on Monday to get it because I can’t phone in the transfer.”
I am sorry, but I have very little faith in any kind of automated system because what will happen is a fellow will say, “I’d like to buy that firearm,” and he’s going on it on the phone for 45 minutes. He won’t be able to get through because he will get, “We’re experiencing an unusually high volume of calls,” and the buyer will eventually just walk away.
As I’ve tried to point out, this is not a problem. The transfer of firearms is not a problem. This goes back 1977 when the FAC system brought in. I have to confess that I was on the firearm committee just prior to Bill C-42 coming out. We even had some problem with the fact that it kind of said the seller has to have no reason to believe that the person can’t acquire the firearm.
I don’t know why it didn’t just say that the purchaser must produce a valid possession and acquisition licence. Had that happened, it would have worked as well as the FAC system worked from 1977 right up to 1995. No vendor will sell to a person they suspect is illegally trying to purchase a firearm. They would always insist on seeing that piece of valid ID.
I have no confidence in any kind of automated system that it will work expeditiously or economically. The long-gun registry is a perfect example, the registry that was going to cost $2 million and ended up costing $1 billion. That’s the experience. I’ve been a gun owner for over 40 years. I’ve seen all these bills go through and heard all the promises that were made. Most of them did not come to fruition.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: For the record, the registry cost $2.5 billion. It ended up being very costly and ineffective and created a false sense of security among police officers.
[English]
Mr. Gamble: I was being optimistic at $1 billion.
Senator Gold: I am trying to get a broader handle on your views. I have two questions. The first is for Mr. Fritter.
A couple of years ago you wrote that the whole gun control program in Canada had virtually no impact on gun violence. Over a number of hearings we have heard in fact that there is evidence linking access to guns to incidents of gun violence, especially in rural areas and especially with regard to long guns.
Leaving that aside, when you say the whole gun control program has had no impact, what would you recommend? Would you do away with gun control altogether in Canada, or what parts would you keep?
Mr. Fritter: Ironically perhaps the phrase I would fall back on was one uttered by Wendy Cukier a few weeks ago when she said what we want is effective gun control.
It’s not a matter of more or less. It’s a matter of making sure that violent offenders can’t go into a gun shop and purchase any gun they want. That is effective gun control.
What I would like to see more contextualization of debate around gun control with regard to costs. If Bill C-71 goes through and if it ends up increasing the workload so dramatically we’re looking at a $250 million per year expenditure, I believe that money could be spent elsewhere. The doctors say that it has to be viewed from a public health context. It does, but we also need to throw the dollars in there.
Out in B.C. we partially reopened the Riverview mental health hospital for $100 million. That was directly correlated a massive rise in the use of opioids in Vancouver. I question whether or not the money is best spent on automated ATT systems or on reopening mental health hospitals.
Senator Gold: Nonetheless, Mr. Fritter, we had evidence from the minister, the officials and others that resources will be applied in various aspects to make sure that the system can be properly administered.
Many of the witnesses and others that you quoted would like Bill C-71 to go further. It would actually have the effect of saving lives and saving the harm that can be caused by the impulsive use of firearms by otherwise law-abiding citizens who turn to firearms in moments of crisis in a domestic violence situation or are seized with personal problems for which they see no way out.
The package of proposals in Bill C-71, including background checks that can focus on whether there has been attempts to harm oneself or others, would be a step toward reducing the harm caused by guns.
What is your comment on the evidence we heard?
Mr. Fritter: Similar to what Mr. Burlew said, rehabilitation is a key component of the Canadian justice system. If someone has committed a crime we don’t hold it against them for the rest of their lives. We offer pardons, et cetera, based on the crime. Our sentencing takes into account rehabilitation processes and whatnot. It seems quite strange to me as a gun owner that the application for a gun licence is one thing you can do that means you’re never forgiven for anything you do. Everything will be dredged up and you will have to answer for things you did 15, 20 or 30 years ago.
Senator Gold: Are you not aware of the actual process? The Chief Firearms Officer will not be looking at some foolish incident in high school 40 years ago, but at threatening behaviour or incidents of violence or threatened violence against one’s intimate partner. It’s not an automatic ban just because you did something foolish 30 years ago.
Mr. Fritter: My issue is that there are no restrictions on it. When you say they won’t be focusing on something that was done 14 years ago, we see abuses of systems like this quite frequently by officials that dig unnecessarily deeply.
I question whether or not we should be limiting that kind of stuff. Ed Burlew is probably a person who can speak to that more.
Senator Gold: I had other questions, but I think I’ve taken enough time. I’ll let others go.
Senator McPhedran: This is a question for Mr. Fritter, Mr. Burlew and Mr. Gamble. To each of you, are you owners of cars?
Mr. Fritter: Yes.
Mr. Gamble: Yes.
Mr. Burlew: I have four cars.
Senator McPhedran: Were you involved in the purchase of the cars that you own including the registration of those cars?
Mr. Fritter: Yes.
Mr. Gamble: Yes.
Mr. Burlew: Yes, but I am going to point out a difference.
Senator McPhedran: No, that is fine. Were you involved in the insurance registration related to the ownership of those cars? Yes or no.
Mr. Gamble: Yes.
Mr. Fritter: Yes.
Mr. Burlew: Yes, I am fine with all those laws.
Senator McPhedran: Do any of you have any affiliation with the National Rifle Association in the United States? My question includes support of any kind, including financial or otherwise, from either the NRA as an association or individuals known to be associated with the NRA.
Mr. Fritter: No.
Mr. Gamble: Yes, I belong to the NRA. I joined it mainly because for $25 a year I get their magazine which is an excellent publication.
Senator McPhedran: Does your organization have an affiliation with the NRA? Do you receive any kind of support to either your publication or your organization, Mr. Gamble?
Mr. Gamble: I believe it’s in the National Rifle Association constitution that they cannot provide any financial resources or support to any organization outside of the United States. That is in their constitution.
Senator McPhedran: Financial, I believe. What about other kinds of support?
Mr. Gamble: Any official affiliation. I mean I’ve met the past president of the National Rifle Association, Sandra Froman. She was the president a few years back.
In terms of official affiliation, it is in the NRA constitution that everything they do officially must be inside the United States.
Senator McPhedran: Mr. Burlew, did you want to answer the question?
Mr. Burlew: Sure, I do. I am a member of the NRA. My father was a member of the NRA. I am the only lawyer in Canada to whom the NRA refers its members when they have a transgression of the firearms laws in Canada.
I will also confirm that the NRA may not make any payments that are beyond the borders of the United States. I also know many members of the NRA.
Senator McPhedran: That would include payments for any legal defence that you might provide.
Mr. Burlew: They don’t pay for that. That is paid for by the person who is accused. Usually it is a person who has come across the border and forgotten to declare all their guns. They thought it wasn’t too important, but boy it is important in Canada. You’re going to do time in jail for that.
Senator McPhedran: I have a question for Mr. Fritter as the publisher and frequent author in the Calibre gun magazine. In an article written by you, you said, “We do not have a gun crime problem in Canada.” In that article you cited Statistics Canada, that 3 per cent of violent crimes reported by police are also reported to have been committed with guns.
You indicated the statistic was sufficiently small that we do not have a gun crime problem in Canada, but that statistic of 3 per cent represents over 7,000 human beings.
Could you please help me understand how you would reach the conclusion that we do not have a gun crime problem in Canada?
Mr. Fritter: The 97 per cent that aren’t affiliated with guns also involves human beings.
Senator McPhedran: So those 7,000 human beings that have been affected don’t count in your estimation.
Mr. Fritter: No, they definitely do count. They absolutely do. As Mr. Gamble pointed out, 9,000 people died of an opioid epidemic.
I guess I view every life as something sacred to be preserved. If someone dies with a needle in their arm, I don’t view it any different from someone being shot. Neither of them wants to die.
Senator McPhedran: But your conclusion from the statistics is that Canada does not have a gun crime problem.
Mr. Fritter: Perhaps I misspoke and should have said it is not a priority issue. Obviously, that is a personal opinion and everyone can interpret their own.
Senator McPhedran: I have a question for Mr. Gamble in relation to the website of The Sporting Clubs of Niagara. I think you’re the author of this, but please correct me if I misunderstood the way it’s listed on the website. The grammar is yours, not mine:
There is 75,000 signatures against Bill C-71. We also have a muslim mosque that collected just 75 signatures to ban assualt weapons (aka civilian carbines) and this muslim petition of just 75 signatures is what the government is noticing; yet, our tax paying citizens’ petition of 75,000 signatures against Bill C-71 gets ignored as if it never existed.
Mr. Gamble, one of the things we try to do here is review proposed laws and make our decisions based on evidence.
Could you please help us understand the evidence on which you rely in making the statement that I have just quoted?
Mr. Gamble: Actually that’s not my statement. We have a fellow who runs our website. That was something he posted.
Senator McPhedran: Did you see it before it was posted?
Mr. Gamble: Actually I don’t go to the website that often.
Senator McPhedran: So you’re representing The Sporting Clubs of Niagara, but you have no control or oversight of your website.
Mr. Gamble: Our organization is an all-volunteer organization, so it is not that everything that occurs there has to be run through me.
Senator McPhedran: Just to clarify this further, there is another posting on the website that is titled “Handgun ban proposal abnormal.”
Did you have anything to do with that statement? Do you know who was the author of that statement?
Mr. Gamble: Do you have the text of that?
Senator McPhedran: Yes. The quote is quite long, so I’ll try to shorten it.
All these acts were justified cause the abnormal people that are up in arms to ban guns don’t own a gun but all the other objects used prior are familiar to them, . . .
This is in reference to the van that was used to murder people in Toronto.
. . . so they get busy scratching their chins and think of a mental disorder to justify those wrong acts by the abnormal people cause a gun was not used, woot woot, so they can get the abnormal people back into society to live another day.
Hey, after all, its not their fault. Neither its the Van’s fault, knife’s fault, snow plows fault and all the other objects ever used to harm people. But as soons as a gun is used, holy shit, lets ban that gun. For all you younge peple out there, regardless of what you are taught, this abnormal proposal is as good as someone telling you that you cannot own a cell phone cause someone used one in an IED attack and killed innocent people.
Were you involved with this?
Mr. Gamble: I am sorry, no, I was not.
Senator McPhedran: How does this publication relate to the official position that you hold for the Niagara gun club in relation to the website that is for that same organization?
Mr. Gamble: Actually, up until the demise of the long-gun registry, we regularly published newsletters, ran gun shows, et cetera. Once the long-gun registry was done away with, we scaled our activities back. We produced no newsletters. We still are involved in presentations to interested groups and that sort of thing.
In fact, I am not computer literate enough to run a website. We have a young fellow who puts the information on the website. Some of the stuff he runs by me; some of it he does not.
Senator McPhedran: Did he run by you either of these?
Mr. Gamble: Neither one, no.
Senator McPhedran: Do you agree with the position expressed in these two quotes?
Mr. Gamble: No, I don’t. Like I say, it’s a volunteer organization. People volunteer their time. Even though I am the president, it’s not that everything has to be approved by me before it’s done.
Senator McPhedran: But we will take this as a statement of The Sporting Clubs of Niagara because it’s on your website.
Mr. Gamble: If I am the president, I guess I have to own up to it, but those are not my statements.
Senator Pratte: Mr. Gamble, you mention in your presentation the grandfathering of firearms, which you called confiscation, is something more akin to countries like North Korea and you named another country.
Correct me if I am wrong, but understanding was that grandfathering had been used in 1977 or 1978 when fully automatic firearms were prohibited, when a majority of handguns were prohibited and when converted fully automatic guns were prohibited. There may be more that I am not aware of, but at least in these three instances governments of all political stripes used grandfathering as a way of dealing with a situation where suddenly a number of guns are prohibited. Am I correct?
Mr. Gamble: Yes, sir, that is correct.
Senator Pratte: I don’t know if it’s like North Korea, but if it is we have been like North Korea for quite awhile.
Mr. Gamble: I don’t think that’s a good thing. I should also point out, sir, that fully automatic firearms were prohibited and grandfathered in 1978. To my knowledge, there has not been one documented homicide committed in Canada with a registered full automatic firearm by the registered owner ever.
These firearms were all prohibited. Because this was done in 1978, they will all be confiscated from the owners, all of whom are now probably well into their 60s, 70s and 80s. These firearms will all be confiscated when these people die.
I have researched it a bit but, as I said, to my knowledge there has never been one single homicide committed with that class of firearm by the registered owner.
Senator Pratte: Is it my understanding that in your view, if you had your way, fully automatic firearms would not be prohibited in Canada?
Mr. Gamble: I am not saying that. I am just saying I think it proves the illogic of prohibiting a certain class of firearms because it is not the firearm that causes the problem. It is the owner of the firearm, and law-abiding, licence holding firearm owners very seldom commit these crimes.
Senator Pratte: Mr. Burlew, I need a clarification from you as the expert or certainly one of the experts in firearms law in Canada.
My understanding is that Canadian courts have had to adjudicate on the issue of five years or more. I have a quote here from the B.C. Court of Appeal:
Anything about the background or conduct of the applicant or licence holder that is relevant to public safety can be considered, including whether it’s for a longer period than five years.
That was confirmed by other courts. That is the information that I have, but I may be mistaken. Will you correct me if I am mistaken?
Mr. Burlew: I am not aware of the one in the B.C. Court of Appeal. I will admit to that. I do know that Judge Durno in the Superior Court in Brampton said that he was not in agreement with the five years. However, I will say that the importance of what I am trying to put to the committee is that it is the point of rehabilitation.
As well, if we are to go back more than five years, and we’re doing it in the context of a court, then the courts are aware of rehabilitation. They have the guidance and the knowledge to do that.
Even when they are looking back and even in the decision of Judge Durno about 10 years ago which had to do with licensing, that case was focused on the present state of the person who was the applicant for the licence. A context was provided but it was the present state which was overriding the court in their decision.
Senator Pratte: If there is an unreasonable decision taken following the amendments from Bill C-71, am I correct that there is an appeal process, with which you’re very familiar, for a provincial court judge? Therefore, if ever a firearms officer rejected an application for the wrong reasons, there is an appeal process.
Mr. Burlew: Oh, there is, and it’s under section 74 of the Firearms Act. It can go up to the Superior Court after that and, with leave, to the Court of Appeal of the province where it stops.
Senator Pratte: Doesn’t that protect people from eventual unreasonable decisions?
Mr. Burlew: I don’t think it does because there is the practicality of paying for counsel to represent you and the process itself. Going to court is an onerous process. When you’re starting out from a negative standpoint, it is very difficult.
It is also made very difficult when we have licensing in the same court as criminal matters. The judges are not always familiar with showing the same level of proof. In licensing it’s the civil level of proof, whereas in the criminal court it is beyond a reasonable doubt. I have had many issues with that over the many cases I have done.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: I would like to welcome our witnesses and apologize for being late. Mr. Burlew, this bill will make the RCMP responsible for classifying firearms. Do you think the RCMP is competent to do that?
[English]
Mr. Burlew: In a word, no. Let me explain very briefly.
The RCMP forensic division will look at a gun or a weapon on a tabletop. That’s the only place they have; they have a tabletop. Their mandate is to look at the gun on the tabletop and determine whether it is an antique; under 500 feet per second, in which case no licence is needed; or restricted, non-restricted or prohibited.
However, there is more that flows from each of those decisions than is within the mandate or ability of the RCMP. In other words, what does it mean to have this gun approved for Canadian civilian use?
We see that a great deal was caused in terms of problems with respect to the Ruger 10/22 modified firearm called a charger pistol.
In 2006 that was allowed into the country. About 300 were brought in. I don’t think there were many more than that. I would have to look it up. Because of that, it was a restricted pistol only able to hold 10 rounds. However, the Ruger 10/22 rifle, being a .22 Rimfire could have a 30-round or 50-round magazine.
Over a million of those came in. They continued to come into the country even after the year 2006. It took the RCMP until 2015 to figure out they had made a mistake in 2006 and to cut off the importation of those higher capacity magazines.
In the meantime, all of these had flooded into Canada with criminality attaching to each one of them. That had not been determined. Nor was it within the mandate of the RCMP. That’s why more is needed than just the RCMP forensic looking at the tabletop.
I am not saying to eliminate that, but I am saying that that must be augmented. It must be augmented not just by Parliament but also by industry because industry wants to be successful. They want people to enjoy their hobbies of hunting, target shooting and collecting guns. They don’t want to have failures.
We’re all in a positive mood. We all want to stop gun violence. We all want to have things enjoyable. We have to work together to build a system that recognizes the needs of industry, Parliament, society and the police.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Mr. Fritter, earlier you talked about the possibility of personal information being stolen or sold. Recently, shops in Lac-Saint-Jean and Chicoutimi were robbed. Do you think the information retailers keep can be stolen? Who might be able to use that information, and to what end?
[English]
Mr. Fritter: The obvious answer is any criminal element looking to obtain firearms in an easier manner than smashing into a gun store.
In recent years we have seen gun stores get targeted more and more frequently. They have responded with bars on the windows, bollards in front to prevent vehicles from breaking in, monitored alarms, prioritized response from police and whatnot. Obviously it is not feasible for 2.2 million gun owners to live behind bars and bollards at their houses.
It wouldn’t take long before an enterprising gang unit of some sort would figure out that instead of breaking into gun shops all they have to do is break into their computer system or, conversely, bribe an employee to get the information.
We are talking about this now but this will be law potentially in 10 or 20 years, at which point we won’t be working with a paper ledger anymore that someone can literally lift from a store. We will be dealing with an electronic database that will be maintained by a local store owner who probably has bigger concerns than: “Is my database secure enough?” They are worried about making their GST remittance, their profit and loss statements, employee salaries; you name it. It will not be the priority it absolutely needs to be and legally should be.
Like I said, there is no way to put that genie back in the bottle. You saw Adam Caruana in here from FOC. That store does huge business. Every day they sell a ton of guns. If that ledger goes missing in 10 years, there will be literally tens of thousands of addresses that will never go back in the bottle. People will know there are guns there, and the problem we have now will be dramatically bigger.
Senator Pratte: I wanted to follow up on this issue. You mentioned that future ledgers, or whatever retailers will put the information in, is the beginning of a registry or a back-door registry.
You know this much better than I do, but my understanding is from 1977 to 1995, when the long-gun registry was implemented, each retailer had to keep a complete record of its sales. Was that the beginning of a gun registry at the time? If not, what is the difference between now and then?
Mr. Fritter: I don’t think I called this a registry because I think the registry term distracts from the discussion of what it actually is. It is a collection of data. We have to evaluate whether or not this data is something we want to have available.
As I have said, it’s not a question of whether or not the data should be recorded. The question is that the law does not protect the data. As far as I am concerned, that’s my data. It is my name and address that go in a book. It is fine if the law says that it wants to know who is buying guns. If police need to launch an investigation, they can have access to it. That’s one thing. It’s another thing to tell me, “We’re going to collect this information, but we are not going to put any kind of legal ramifications in there for someone that misuses it.”
Senator Pratte: If I may, the bill does not require that the name and the address of the buyer be recorded. That’s not in the bill. The bill requires the PAL number but not the name and the address.
If there is personal information in the retailer records, that’s protected by the Privacy Act.
Mr. Fritter: Yes. Although the bill requires that they list PAL and firearm details, it doesn’t limit it to that. My concern is that some of the big box retailers already take down names and addresses for various purchases because their legal departments are worried.
Senator Pratte: So it’s the case now.
Mr. Fritter: What do you mean?
Senator Pratte: It is the case now that major retailers record this information, the names and addresses, and they keep it.
Mr. Fritter: My issue is that right now most gun owners don’t stop at those stores specifically to prevent their name from being recorded in that kind of book.
If this law passes, we’ll have that problem tenfold. Retailers will look at it and say, “If I am supposed to record the PAL, maybe I should record more just in case.”
The Chair: Mr. Gamble, Mr. Fritter and Mr. Burlew, thank you so much for joining us today. We appreciate your making the effort to be here, particularly Mr. Fritter since this was your second attempt. We’re grateful for the contribution you have made.
(The committee continued in camera.)