Senator Moreau, next week marks the beginning of the 12 days of action to end violence against women. Every year from November 25 to December 6, we all join forces to tackle this issue.

According to the United Nations, somewhere in the world, a woman is killed every 10 minutes. In Canada, there were 187 femicides in 2024, and 62 of them were committed with firearms.

How is the government ensuring that firearms licensing provisions effectively protect at-risk individuals in situations of intimate partner or family violence?

I believe that when the minister was here yesterday, he expressed the government’s strong condemnation of all forms of violence, especially violence against women. The increase in gender-based violence is deeply disturbing and reminds us that we urgently need to explore its root causes. In 2023, as you know, Parliament passed Bill C-21, which amended a number of firearm provisions, including one that prevented individuals with a history of intimate partner violence from purchasing a firearm.

I’m a hunter myself, Senator Oudar, and I currently need to renew my firearm possession and acquisition licence. One of the things that the RCMP verifies when someone submits an application to get or renew a licence is whether the applicant’s conjugal partner has provided consent. If the conjugal partner hasn’t signed the form, the RCMP has a duty to contact them.

Thank you, Senator Moreau. However, as you know, these new measures must be supported by other amendments to the Firearms Act, which, once in force, will introduce the term “protection order,” the meaning of which still needs to be assigned in regulations, to quote the government’s own website. My question is, when will this order come into force?

As I have said to your colleagues in response to other questions, I can’t speculate on the agenda in terms of the tabling of these additional regulations. I am confident that the government will move forward on this.

However, I would like to point out that budget 2025 allocates $660.5 million over five years to advance gender equality, which includes measures to strengthen Canada’s response to gender-based violence. When a more specific program —