Hon. Mary Coyle: Honourable senators, I rise today on the unceded lands of the Anishinaabe Algonquin Nation to speak at third reading on Bill C-21, a bill that aims to build on existing national gun-control legislation and other measures designed to build a safer Canada for all of us.

Colleagues, Sunday marked the conclusion of the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence, and last week we marked our National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women. And here we are tonight considering a violence-prevention bill.

This important and long-awaited legislation has more than one purpose. Bill C-21 is aimed at reducing and preventing gun violence that we are seeing in cities, often perpetrated by gangs. It is aimed at preventing further mass tragedies, such as the one experienced in my province in 2020, as well as the Quebec City mosque massacre targeting Muslims and the École Polytechnique massacre targeting women.

Bill C-21 is aimed at addressing violence against women, all forms of gender-based violence and family violence in rural and urban areas. Finally, it aims to reduce devastating incidents of self-harm and suicide.

We often feel smug living next to our gun-toting American neighbours to the south, where there are 400 million civilian firearms owned and, tragically, where gun violence and mass shootings have reached epidemic proportions. But, colleagues, Canada has one of the highest rates of gun ownership among industrialized countries. We are fourth among the 38 OECD countries in the rate of firearm death, and we have the third-highest rate of firearm homicide among populous high-income countries after the U.S. and Chile.

Bill C-21 will — and I will explain what it is going to do — bring in a national handgun freeze. This is not a ban. There will be no confiscation of legally owned handguns. The number of legally owned handguns has grown since 2006 from 360,000 to over 1 million, owned by 275,000 Canadians.

Second, it brings a new prospective — not retroactive — definition of assault-style weapon characteristics. Hunters will not lose their guns. It is estimated that there are 7 million to 8 million rifles and shotguns owned by 2.5 million Canadians.

Bill C-21 introduces red flag and yellow flag laws with the purpose of reducing and preventing family violence, intimate partner violence, self-harm and suicide.

It also has measures to strengthen border control, to prevent firearms smuggling and trafficking and requiring a firearms licence in order to import ammunition.

The bill includes measures to address illegally manufactured guns done through 3-D printing, often referred to as “ghost guns.” It introduces new firearms-related offences and strengthens penalties.

Colleagues, at its most basic, the expectation is that over time this bill will reduce, or at least cap, the number of guns circulating in Canada and thus reduce the opportunities for gun-related death and harm in our society.

Those are the basics. Senator Yussuff already provided us with far more detail on the bill and its key components.

Unfortunately, some of our fellow Canadians have been misled on some aspects of the bill and, frankly, on some of the broader issues around guns, gun-related crimes, gun-control legislation and gun rights in Canada.

The area of misinformation and, in some cases, intentional disinformation is one I would like to probe a little in my remarks on Bill C-21 today. It’s important to understand some of the powerful influences at play here. We’ve seen cases of misinformation and disinformation in relation to other important societal matters — ones we’ve discussed in this chamber — related to COVID, climate change and, more recently, the rights of LGBTQ children and youth. These are a threat to our democracy.

It is very important for all Canadians to understand that, as Justice Peter Cory said, quoted in R. Blake Brown’s article “Firearm ‘Rights’ in Canada: Law and History in the Debates over Gun Control”:

Canadians, unlike Americans, do not have a constitutional right to bear arms. Indeed, most Canadians prefer the peace of mind and sense of security derived from the knowledge that the possession of automatic weapons is prohibited.

Some disinformation circulating suggests that Bill C-21 would ban hunting guns and that potentially all guns could be banned by the bill.

Rich Igercich, National President of the National Firearms Association, said this of Bill C-21:

This is one of the worst attacks against rights and freedoms and livelihoods and property in Canadian history.

Although the Canadian Coalition for Firearms Rights claims that it is in fact anti-gun lobbyists who are spreading false rumours about American involvement in Canadian gun lobbies, two recent Bloomberg articles draw some concerning connections with the U.S. government, the American firearms industry, the NRA and other U.S. gun lobbies and their counterparts in countries like Canada. In the first Bloomberg article entitled “NRA-Style Politics Transformed Canada’s Gun Culture — and Shootings Rose 869%,” the authors wrote that “The NRA helped the homegrown Canadian Sport Shooting Association set up a political arm to battle the expanded rule.”

At that time, that was the long-gun registry.

The American organization also coached the Canadian group’s members in grassroots advocacy to promote pro-gun candidates in the 2006 election.

I continue citing the Bloomberg article.

Over the past 2 decades, the annual volume of US-made semi-automatic firearm imports into Canada has increased almost 10 fold. During this period, the annual number of crimes fell slightly, while the number of violent crimes remained fairly flat . . . yet firearms related crimes more than doubled . . . and shootings increased 869% from 219 in 2003 to 2,123 in 2022. In January, the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives disclosed for the first time that of the almost 25,000 Canadian crime guns it traced from 2017-2021, 1 in 3 had been legally imported from the US.

The Bloomberg article continues:

The NRA says its “quiet diplomacy” makes it the world’s most influential firearm advocate. James Baranowski, the organization’s director of international affairs, cited the Canadian debate over Trudeau’s policies while addressing the group’s January 2021 board meeting. He said the NRA’s efforts are often “in the shadows” but the results can be seen and heard around the world.

In the second Bloomberg article entitled “US Gun Exports Surge, Fueling Violence Around the World,” the authors indicate that:

To fuel its overseas push, the US firearms industry, through its political allies, has managed to weaken gun-control laws and seed pro-gun advocacy in other countries.

They state that “. . . the US government has helped push international sales of rapid-fire guns to record levels.” Canada is a top customer.

The US Commerce Department has played a booster role in the firearms industry, even as America’s mass shootings horrify the world and gun crime rates rise in many of the importing countries.

SIG Sauer, a successful U.S.-based firearms exporter, has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the NRA and the U.S. National Shooting Sports Foundation, and in 2016 donated $100,000 to #GUNVOTE, a Super PAC that heavily supported former President Donald Trump.

Now in the Canadian media, The Walrus magazine published an article in September 2021 entitled “Why Gun-Rights Advocates Partner With Islamophobic Groups.” The article outlined how a then-field officer for the Canadian Coalition for Firearms Rights, Colin Saunders, spoke on the podium at an event on Parliament Hill sponsored by Canadian Combat Coalition, or C3, a known anti-Muslim hate group. He stood and said, “I’m proud to stand here with a bunch of real Canadians who stand up for real values.” Linkages between guns and White supremacists have been identified in both the U.S. and Canada. Giffords Law Center has an interesting article on how America’s gun laws fuel armed hate, and Time magazine in 2022 published an article entitled “White Supremacy Is Deadly. Guns Make It Deadlier.”

In a 2019 Macleans magazine article, Dr. Pam Palmater wrote, “Guns and white supremacists don’t mix.”

Colleagues, we know that definitely not all members of Canadian firearms rights organizations are heavily influenced by the U.S. gun lobby and that most gun owners in Canada are certainly not predisposed to be members of hate groups. However, we do know that hate groups and their members tend to own and amass stashes of weapons, and that makes them more dangerous, and we know that academics are beginning to trace connections between extreme right-wing and White supremacist groups and the gun lobby.

We also know that some members of the Canadian gun lobby are employing NRA-style intimidation and silencing strategies on those in Canada calling for greater gun control. Dr. Najma Ahmed, a doctor who treated some victims of the 2018 Toronto Danforth shooting and a member of Canadian Doctors for Protection from Guns, was targeted by the Canadian Coalition for Firearms Rights. The CCFR encouraged their social media followers to file complaints against Dr. Ahmed with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario. The doctor was also told to “stay in your lane, doctor,” reminiscent of what the NRA had told the American College of Physicians to do a few months earlier after ACP issued a paper framing gun violence as a public health issue.

R. Blake Brown, Canada’s foremost historian on gun control, said:

In the 1970s, there weren’t a lot of Canadian gun groups. They were mostly hunting groups that adamantly rejected being labeled as lobbies. But times have changed. Canadians who once rejected the idea that they were somehow affiliated or influenced by the NRA in the 1970s are now more willing to adopt some of those ideas.

Of course, there was no social media in the 1970s.

Colleagues, it really does come down to what kind of society we want to live in and leave for future generations. Our proximity to the U.S. and this age of powerful social media influence makes our jobs as legislators and the jobs of all who want a Canada safe from gun violence all the more difficult and complex. We know that countries like Australia and the United Kingdom and Japan have implemented more comprehensive gun control measures than Canada, and these countries have achieved lower rates of firearm-related deaths and mass shootings compared to Canada.

The U.K. banned handguns following the Dunblane school massacre in Scotland in 1996. There have been no school shootings and one mass shooting event since then in the U.K.

Bill C-21 passed without amendments at committee. Colleagues, we know this bill is not perfect, but I believe it takes several important steps to respond to the recommendations of the Nova Scotia Mass Casualty Commission, the Renfrew County inquest, and to the pleas of the mass shooting victim groups, PolySeSouvient, Danforth Families for Safe Communities, and Centre Culturel Islamique de Québec.

Honourable colleagues, in conclusion, I support Bill C-21 and its measures designed to safeguard Canadians from gun violence in all its forms. Colleagues, life, after all — all lives — are precious gifts. Let’s pass what I consider a sensible gun control bill which, as the evidence demonstrates, is designed to protect and to save lives. Honourable colleagues, Canadians want a safer Canada. Let’s take this important step while at the same time continuing to insist on much more. Thank you, colleagues. Wela’lioq.