44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 16, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, at the very beginning of his speech, the member mentioned that there is no place for handguns in Canadian society. I think I quoted him almost verbatim. While I agree there is no place for illegal handguns that criminals are using to commit crimes, I would like to remind him of a quote, especially since sitting very close to him there is a proud Olympian who might find this quote interesting.
It is by Lynda Kiejko, an Olympian in women's pistol shooting. She said, “I take great pride in representing my country on the—”
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Madam Speaker, I should say the member has a good Olympian on his team over there, who may be interested to hear this.
Lynda Kiejko said:
I take great pride in representing my country on the world stage, as do all athletes. I'm sad that due to the handgun ban, the order in council, Bill C-71 and this proposed legislation, I will not be able to represent Canada on the world stage. Athletes who come after me won't even have an opportunity to compete, as they will have no access to competition firearms.
What would the member opposite like me to tell this Olympian, who has proudly represented our flag at the Olympics in the past?
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Madam Speaker, there is an exemption for Olympians, but not for someone who is not in the Olympics, so no one would be able to train to get there.
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Madam Speaker, I want to be very clear: The Liberal government does not want us to debate Bill C-21. It wants it to be imposed on this House and on Canadians.
Today, we are limited to just a single day of debate, because the Liberal government decided to force a closure motion through the House to prevent parliamentarians from debating this legislation in detail. This is fundamentally undemocratic, and it is certainly not in the best interest of those who will be affected by many of its problematic measures.
When Bill C-21 was announced by the public safety minister last fall, Conservatives were hopeful that this bill would include measures that are tough on crime and that would crack down on illegally smuggled handguns, which are contributing to the 32% increase in violent crime since the Prime Minister took office.
However, the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security was instead presented with a deeply flawed piece of legislation that needed to be amended countless times by the Liberal government and opposition parties. We have heard from numerous witnesses and stakeholders that this bill will do nothing to crack down on the violent criminals who are terrorizing our streets.
The constituents of Liberal, NDP and Bloc members in rural ridings know very well what this legislation does. If it passes, the only people it will materially affect are law-abiding firearms owners who use their firearms as tools to hunt, sport-shoot and protect their livestock, while street gangs and criminals can continue to use their illegally smuggled firearms.
To reiterate, this legislation affects 2.3 million law-abiding firearms owners, thousands of small businesses and jobs, and, as a result, hundreds of millions of dollars of the economy. Before getting into the specific deficiencies of this legislation, I want to take a moment and revisit how the Liberal government made a mess of this situation.
In late November, forgoing the usual practices of doing any form of consultation or technical briefings for parliamentarians and the media, the Minister of Public Safety table-dropped amendments at the eleventh hour that constituted what would be the largest ban on hunting rifles and shotguns in Canadian history.
The Liberal government would like people to believe that the only ones who opposed its misguided amendments were members of the Conservative Party. In reality, the push-back against the Liberal Party's poorly planned amendments and legislation was driven by a grassroots movement of hunters, sport shooters, indigenous groups and farmers who are concerned about their livelihood, their sport, their culture and, above all, public safety.
Naturally, hunters, sport shooters, farmers, indigenous groups and provincial and territorial premiers from coast to coast took notice and voiced their concerns. Even members of the Liberal caucus stood up and said that they would not be able to vote in favour of Bill C-21 if these amendments were included in the bill. Canadians saw these amendments for what they were: the largest assault on law-abiding firearms owners in Canadian history.
As a result, the Liberals withdrew their amendments, and the opposition parties on the public safety committee began consultations, which the Liberal government had failed to do, on the proposed amendments to Bill C-21. We heard from a diverse range of voices that shared their concerns with the amendments and the lack of consultation from the Liberal government.
I would like to highlight one individual’s testimony in particular. Chief Jessica Lazare of the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake spoke to us and stated that no consultations were done prior to drafting the government’s amendments to Bill C-21 or prior to Bill C-21 itself. She noted that while she appreciated the Minister of Public Safety taking the time to meet briefly with the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake, she did not consider that meeting to be a consultation.
Unfortunately, the Liberals dismissed legitimate concerns such as these by repeatedly, in the House and in committee, calling them disinformation and misinformation.
My colleagues and I wrapped up these consultations with stakeholders on March 10 and waited patiently for the Minister of Public Safety to come before our committee and testify. In fact, I think many Canadians at home would be surprised to know that our committee waited six full weeks, until April 25, to hear from the minister.
Shortly after, the Liberals introduced new amendments, which, to be clear, are the same as the old ones, and the commonly used hunting firearms targeted by the Liberals in the fall would likely be added to the ban by the new Liberal firearms advisory panel. Conservatives have no confidence that this advisory panel would do anything other than advise the minister to take legally obtained firearms away from law-abiding Canadians.
Now that we have discussed the abuse of process and the failure of the government regarding this legislation, I will go on to outline some of the problematic measures in Bill C-21, which have widespread opposition from stakeholders.
First, the Liberal government introduced a regime known as “red flag laws”. We have heard almost unanimously from stakeholders that Bill C-21’s proposed red flag measures are costly, ineffective and redundant. We have red flag laws in this country under section 117 of the Criminal Code. Police services have the authority to act immediately, with or without a warrant, when there is a genuine concern for public safety. However, Bill C-21 attempts to introduce a regime whereby victims would have to stand in front of a judge in a secret hearing without the other party present and without any access to police resources in order to have firearms taken away from a dangerous individual.
During our deliberations on this bill, we heard from women's and community groups such as the National Association of Women and the Law, PolySeSouvient and the Battered Women's Support Services, which all said that the proposed red flag laws were unnecessary and counterproductive and could be even harmful.
We also heard from indigenous leaders, such as Terry Teegee from the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations and Heather Bear from the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations, who both expressed concerns with the fact that these provisions do not clearly outline how they would respect the hunting rights of indigenous individuals.
Even further, we heard from medical professionals, such as Dr. Atul Kapur from the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians, who stated, “Placing the onus on victims of interpersonal violence or on a family member of a depressed person...is largely unworkable and an unwelcome hindrance to getting the guns temporarily out of the homes of those in crisis.”
We also heard from law enforcement officers, such as Dale McFee from the Edmonton Police Service, who stated that this law “would pose a significant draw on police resources should numerous applications be granted at a time when many Canadian police services are [already] stretched thin.”
Conservatives on the public safety committee listened to this testimony. They recognized that these measures are harmful and proposed to have them removed entirely from the bill. Unfortunately, the Liberal-NDP coalition voted against that, effectively silencing the voices of women's groups, indigenous leaders, law enforcement and medical professionals.
Another issue that the Liberal government touted as being tough on crime is increasing maximum sentences from 10 years to 14 years for illegal gun traffickers. While we support these measures in principle, we know that the current government's soft-on-crime policy means that not a single person has ever received the current maximum sentence for these crimes in the eight years that the Liberals have been in power.
Finally, this legislation targets competitive sport shooters in such a severe way that it would literally lead to the demise of the sport. The legislation effectively means that those who use lawfully obtained handguns to safely participate in an internationally recognized sport would no longer be able to do so. Noah Schwartz, a professor of political science at the University of the Fraser Valley, commented on these measures, noting that “firearms, and the shooting sports that they facilitate, allow people to connect with family, friends and a broader community of gun owners. At a time when making social connections is more difficult than ever, it seems strange to sacrifice these communities for a false impression of safety.”
Bill C-21 would outlaw competitive sport shooting, except for individuals who are already training for the Olympics. I would encourage the Liberal members to consider how one can become an Olympic athlete without training and practice. Reasonable amendments to this prohibition from the Conservatives to allow members of the International Practical Shooting Confederation to continue their sport were unfortunately voted down.
What may be surprising to many is that members of the Liberal government tried to stop a rural member of their own caucus from speaking out against these measures at the public safety committee. Thankfully, the Conservative members on the committee gave up some of their own time so that he could speak. That member spoke out against the restrictions on competitive sport shooting, stating, “If there is one organization outside of Olympic shooters this committee and indeed this government should consider, I think it's IPSC.”
This is more evidence that the government does not want to hear the voices of hunters, sport shooters and farmers. It is not interested in the lives of the rural Canadians whom the legislation would impact.
It is time for the Liberals to get serious about tackling the root causes of criminal violence. In the eight years since the Prime Minister took office, violent crime has increased by 32% and gang-related murders have doubled. I have no faith that this legislation would do anything to reverse that trend. Only a Conservative government would invest in policing and secure borders to address the real root cause of crime, rather than spending billions of dollars on confiscating firearms from law-abiding farmers, hunters and indigenous people.
In closing, we were all elected to this House to represent the voices of our constituents, and the limited time we have today to debate this legislation stifles our ability to do so. I would like to thank the members of my community and individuals across Canada who have reached out to me about this important issue. They can rest assured that I will continue to advocate for law-abiding Canadian firearms owners, despite the Liberal government's draconian tactics.
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Madam Speaker, there are so many questions there that I am not sure which ones I will answer in the short five minutes I have.
First of all, I have never done any fundraising on this issue.
I have been on the public safety committee now for a year and a half and have sat through hours and hours of discussion on this topic. Do I think this is going to make our communities any safer? No, not whatsoever. This is going to affect law-abiding firearms owners, not the illegal criminals who are bringing handguns across the border. That is really where the issue is, and this will not affect that whatsoever.
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Madam Speaker, as I mentioned in my speech, and if people were not listening I will repeat that part, in the past eight years, I believe, the maximum has never once been given. Yes, we agree with longer sentences, but if the maximum is not being given, what is the point of increasing it?
We need to work on reducing crime, and we believe in giving harsher sentences, especially to people who are committing harsh crimes with firearms across the country.
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Madam Speaker, what I would like to talk about in response to that is factual information. It was amazing how much the NDP and the Liberals were siding with each other in those debates the member is talking about. We sat in that committee for so long, and I am curious to see what members from places such as Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, Courtenay—Alberni, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, North Island—Powell River, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, Timmins—James Bay and Nunavut all have to say in the next election—
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Madam Speaker, I was not mispronouncing the ridings whatsoever. They are great areas. I have been to some of them and I would like to get to even more. I was in Nunavut last summer and it was very interesting.
What I was pointing out is that all of these rural ridings I am sure will be very interested to know that the members of the NDP were siding with the Liberals at all the committee meetings and on all of the votes with respect to the firearms concern.
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Madam Speaker, that is a great question. Yes, there is a lot of concern over that. We have no details on it, which is very concerning. We do not know who is going to be on the committee. We are assuming its members are going to be appointed by the Liberals. We feel that, down the road, the exact same hunting rifles and farmers' tools that were placed on the past G-4 and G-46 amendments will be placed on this ban bill again by the firearms advisory commission once it is up and running.
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