44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 21, 2022 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Shefford for her fantastic speech, as well as for her passion, especially on this issue that affects her profoundly and personally. Bravo.
Our constituents ask us about this issue. It comes up all the time in my riding, Drummond, because there are many airsoft fans there. They are concerned. They do not understand why these toy guns were not immediately excluded from the bill, since they only look like weapons and are essentially harmless.
The fact that we are unable to debate this bill for any length of time means that details like that may be ignored and overlooked. That troubles me. I would like to know what my colleague thinks.
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Madam Speaker, that is not what I said.
I am saying that there is work to be done. We must be able to identify these weapons and study the entire issue in committee. The member for Winnipeg North tends to put words in my mouth at times, as he does with many other members. That concerns me as well. When we talk about misinformation—
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Madam Speaker, in response to my colleague's comment about air guns, I will say that the bill needs to explicitly define what an air gun is. I think that the assault weapons that this bill is meant to ban need to be better defined. Such a definition would necessarily exclude air guns, which are for recreational purposes. We could also define what kinds of air guns are acceptable, based on the air pressure in the cylinder, for example. There are a variety of criteria that could be used. I am not a firearms expert.
One thing is certain: What matters most is not the toy guns being used for play, but the real guns shooting real bullets in our streets. I would like people to stop avoiding the topic and stop talking about toys. We need to be talking about the real weapons that are being used to kill real people in our communities every single day.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question. We do think that assault weapons are a serious problem.
With all due respect to the government members, I feel like they are slow learners. Two years ago, they learned that they needed to ban assault weapons, but they did not know how, so they drew up a list of about 1,800 weapons, as I said earlier. That is a step in the right direction. I cannot say it is a misstep, but we would like them to learn a little faster.
We are suggesting that the government clearly describe what an assault weapon is, and then ban that. That would save us a lot of discussion and enable us to move faster and prevent gun manufacturers from skirting the rules by slightly tweaking the assault weapon models in circulation. There may be better solutions, and I invite my colleagues to propose some.
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Uqaqtittiji, during the 2019 election, the member's party promised to make sure that the CBSA had the resources it needed to detect and stop the flow of weapons at our borders.
Why has the Liberal government not restored the more than 1,000 positions cut by previous Conservative governments, which are required to stop the flow of weapons at the Canada-U.S. border?
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Madam Speaker, we realized that the Stephen Harper government did in fact make serious cuts, and as a result, it weakened our borders. We have invested heavily in borders virtually from the very beginning, recognizing that illegal weapons are a very serious issue. We will continue to look at ways to minimize illegal weapons coming into Canada.
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Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate my colleague from Brandon—Souris on his speech, and I have a message for him from the member for Jonquière, who wants to congratulate him on his hard work.
In Bill C‑21, the government opted to include a list of prohibited assault weapons, specifying models. Our colleague from Rivière-du-Nord suggested a completely different approach, which is to precisely define what constitutes an assault weapon so that weapons can be prohibited if they meet the criteria in the definition, not just if they are a certain model. What does my colleague from Brandon—Souris think of that?
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Madam Speaker, there are a lot of good things in the bill and we will have the opportunity to propose amendments at committee.
However, the bill will not allow for the seizure of weapons being used to commit crimes. We know that the weapons being used right now in Montreal are, in many cases, being wielded by criminal groups and that they have been smuggled across the border illegally.
For several weeks, and even months, the Bloc Québécois has been calling on the Minister of Public Safety to create a registry of criminal organizations, so that police officers can apprehend their members and better fight crime in Montreal.
I wonder if my colleague agrees with the suggestion to create a registry like this as quickly as possible, so that we can rid Montreal of these weapons.
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Madam Speaker, the massacres that took place in Quebec, like the ones at the École polytechnique in Montreal and the mosque in Quebec City, were committed with assault weapons, not hunting rifles. Handguns, not hunting rifles, are what are being used in the shootings in the streets of Montreal.
Is it not true that the first thing that should be done is to restrict some people's ability to get their hands on these extremely dangerous weapons?
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Madam Speaker, we are currently discussing a bill that would strengthen gun control. We are prepared to study it and analyze it in committee.
However, as the Montreal police have fully shown and documented, most gun violence is committed with illegal weapons, contraband weapons.
Why is it that the government is not taking steps to stop this smuggling, despite all the pressure we have been exerting for a registry of criminal organizations and more measures at the border?
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