JURI Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON JUSTICE AND LEGAL AFFAIRS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA JUSTICE ET DES QUESTIONS JURIDIQUES

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Monday, November 24, 1997

[English]

• 1533

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney (Erie—Lincoln, Lib.): I call the meeting to order. Hopefully more committee members will drift in, but since we're on such a tight time schedule I would prefer to start.

We have with us today from the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, Chief Brian Ford, chair, and Bryan McConnell, executive director.

Welcome, gentlemen. I understand that you have a written brief, but only in one of our official languages.

Mr. Bryan McConnell (Executive Director, Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police): That's true, Mr. Chair. We do not have the capability for translation in the immediate term. It takes us some time to prepare it.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): That's been a problem today. Unless anyone objects, I suggest we submit the brief in English. It will be translated subsequently.

Yes, Mr. Ramsay.

Mr. Jack Ramsay (Crowfoot, Ref.): With the agreement of everyone present here on the committee, we can receive the brief in one official language. I would ask that be done, so we can follow along, in accordance with the members of the committee.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Are you in agreement, Mr. Lee?

Mr. Derek Lee (Scarborough—Rouge River, Lib.): Mr. Chairman, I remember very clearly that about two or three weeks ago this committee passed a resolution, which I thought was reasonably clear, that where a brief came in one language only, where there was not a two-language brief presentation, it was made available to members but the committee—the clerk—itself would not participate in its distribution. This is out of respect to individuals on the committee whose language is other than the language of the brief. If we don't have it in both languages, the committee is not to distribute it.

• 1535

The one-language availability is helpful to those members who can use that language, so we don't reject it, but I didn't want this committee to begin to roll back the arrangement we had made and adopted three weeks ago by authorizing the clerk to begin.... I didn't want us to start seeking unanimous consent all the time, because that brings us right back to where we were three weeks ago. That causes a member who might use just one language to have to object or acquiesce all the time. That's just not right.

I'm not going to give consent to the clerk's distributing a one-language brief. If the witnesses have a brief and it's made available, members who wish to use it may. It will be of help to the members who—

The Clerk of the Committee: Is that the case? Do you have a brief available?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: Yes, we brought the brief.

[Translation]

I gave it to Luc before we started.

[English]

We'll be more than prepared to proceed on that basis.

[Translation]

I'm quite ready to reply in French to any questions put in that language.

[English]

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): I appreciate your comments, Mr. Lee, but this morning we had the consent of all parties, including the Bloc, to proceed, notwithstanding the fact that these briefs, which were prepared very quickly and on short notice, were in only one of the official languages.

Mr. Derek Lee: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Your position is the same.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Are there extra copies of your brief available?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: Yes, I left about 18 copies with the clerk of the committee.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Well now, what do we do here, Mr. Lee?

Mr. Derek Lee: I'm going to get a copy. The clerk should not have them. The clerk does not distribute one-language briefs. I'm going to do it.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: All right, good for you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Lee.

Okay, Mr. McConnell and Mr. Ford, which of you will speak?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: I'll actually do the presentation. I'm here today with Chief Brian Ford of the Ottawa-Carleton Regional Police Services, who is also the chair of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police law amendments committee. Chief Ford is suffering from a flu and will be able to respond to questions but can't go through the presentation.

With your permission, Mr. Chair, I would like to begin today with some general observations before addressing the firearms regulations that are before you.

Today's presentation is one of a series of appearances by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police before parliamentary committees on Bill C-68 and the firearms program. Chief Ford, colleagues from across Canada, and I have appeared before this committee and its counterpart in the Senate on probably a dozen occasions over the last few years on matters related to Bill C-68 and its regulations. At these presentations we have suggested, debated, argued, and tried to help.

The CACP, like all police organizations, supports the firearm program. It has from the start and continues to do so. In fact, the CACP and Chief Ford's own organization have seconded considerable resources to assist the implementation of the program.

Subject to the following comments, we support these regulations but call on the government to move forward with the implementation. We believe the time for debate on this bill has passed. We would like to see the program up and running.

The CACP recognizes the need to ensure that all processes are in place and that the system is ready to commence in a proper fashion, but at the same time we encourage the government to minimize any delay in implementation. The CACP believes ongoing delay and confusion concerning the firearms program will have a detrimental effect on its potential impact.

Quite simply, the CACP position is, do it right but do it quickly.

The second general point is that we would like to remind the government of its promise to the police community that this program will not draw any additional police resources. May I say that from what we have seen of the system and its methods of operation, we think this promise can and will be met.

• 1540

The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police continues to support the Canadian firearms program and recognizes its important value to the safety of Canadians in all parts of the country. The registry component of the program, and in particular the registration of rifles and shotguns, is crucial to its overall effectiveness. This concern has been expressed by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police on several occasions.

This claim was further substantiated by the study of the working group on smuggling, the illegal movement of firearms in Canada, Department of Justice, May 1995. The study reviewed data on recovered firearms in nine police services and the RCMP. It showed that of the firearms recovered in crime, almost half, 47%, were rifles and shotguns; 21% were handguns and of these, 40% had been previously registered to a lawful owner; 4% were prohibited weapons, and many of these were rifles and shotguns that had been sawn off.

A more recent study of firearms recovered in five communities—Thunder Bay, Windsor, Saint John, Hull, and Regina—once again confirmed these findings. Copies of these studies were released in July 1997. Similar studies in Winnipeg and Edmonton produced similar results.

Therefore, when you review these regulations, you must not forget the context and their importance to the overall program. Registration of firearms, especially rifles and shotguns, is and must remain a fundamental component of this program.

The CACP has been involved in the consultation leading to these regulations and welcomes an opportunity to continue to be part of the legislative process. There have been few situations in our memory where the consultations have been as thorough or as complete.

Having said that, may I say that the consultation process is difficult and not without its controversies, and with respect to these particular regulations, I can advise the committee that there are some issues on which the CACP and other police organizations have advocated a much stronger position; for example, immediate verification and engraving rather than registration stickers.

In the context of the consultation process, the CACP has agreed to compromises. While we believe these regulations continue to present an effective program, the CACP would strongly resist any further compromises on the issues in these regulations. To do so would weaken the very provisions that are the strength of the program.

We therefore call on the committee to expedite its review of the regulations and allow the program to move forward toward a speedy implementation.

Our specific concerns are included in the summary provided last week, but I would like to briefly highlight some of them.

The transfer regulations: The concept of verification is of critical importance. One of the fundamental criticisms of the existing restricted firearms registry is that the information therein is inaccurate or out of date. To have a system that is not effective and efficient is simply a waste of everyone's efforts and the loss of an important opportunity.

We also believe verification can be a positive aspect of the program, particularly if it is properly handled at the community level. More specifically, the CACP understands the reasons for the commencement date of 2003 for verification on the transfer of long guns, but we believe very strongly that verification on transfer of restricted and prohibited firearms should commence immediately. While we respect the need to have an implementation period for verification for long guns, there is little justification to argue for the same thing with respect to handguns.

We also support the verification at the point of registration for firearms. Verification is critically important to this program. As I mentioned earlier, the implementation of this bill has taken longer than a lot of people would have expected. We understand fully that a balance must be struck between taking enough time to ensure that the system is truly ready before it commences and rushing to complete it and having a start-up that is characterized by problems and glitches.

The CACP position is, as I said, do it right but do it quickly. We would ask that you please ensure that there are no further delays. If the date of October 1, 1998, is met, we are confident this system can and will be a success.

• 1545

With respect to the registration certificates regulations, the CACP supports the registration certificate scheme presented under the regulations. While engraving would have been preferred to stickers, the compromise is acceptable.

The importance of the forms to be used in the registration process cannot be underestimated, and we look forward to participating in their development.

Mr. Chair, we have attached some comments on some other points and leave them for the committee's attention.

In conclusion, it is the position of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police that the review of these regulations be completed as quickly as possible and that the program commence in October 1998, as is now called for. We continue to hold the view that this legislation and its program will make a positive contribution to the safety of communities across Canada. It will prevent injuries and death to citizens, as well as to peace officers. The firearms program will facilitate investigations and assist in meaningful anti-crime steps to stem the flow of illegal weapons.

As always, we thank the committee for inviting us here today and for its attention to points we think are important. Chief Ford and I would be happy to address any questions you might have.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thanks, Mr. McConnell.

Mr. Ramsay, you have five minutes. We're on a half-hour timeframe.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Okay, five minutes. You've interpreted “do it right, do it quickly” literally, haven't you?

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): We're trying to keep everybody happy, Mr. Ramsay.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Of course you know my position on this bill, but if we're going to spend millions of dollars on a registration system that is going to do what you have said it will do, we had better do it right, regardless of how long it takes. From the information we've had so far, we're not going to do it right, because we're going to ask millions of gun owners to pick up a form like this somewhere in their community and fill in the 10 identifying features and forward it for registration. I understand that the process from there on will be that a registration certificate will be forwarded to the owner based upon the information contained on the form. Of course no verification is occurring.

As this morning's witnesses, the chief firearms officers from two provinces, said, particularly with regard to the restricted and prohibited firearms, the information contained in the registry on restricted and prohibited firearms will be unverified and hence unreliable. This will impact on police safety, public safety, and enforcement.

We had, I believe, the assistant deputy commissioner in last week. He expressed a similar concern about the integrity of the system, based upon his concern over a lack of verification, which is the old mail-in system that we've been opposing on this side since it was first proposed almost three years ago.

The deputy commissioner of the RCMP said this:

The potential for errors on applications from members of the public who may not be well versed in firearms classification is extremely high.

He went on to say:

If the police services of this country cannot count on the veracity of information entered onto the Canadian Firearms Registration System, they may not use it to its full potential

If this occurs, the system cannot meet its objectives of maintaining and increasing public safety.

The final quote from that presentation is this:

This verification process is bound to be a slow one. Many firearm owners will wait decades to transfer their firearms.

Putting it another way, the firearm I have I don't intend to transfer, I don't intend to sell, so what will happen? The firearm will go in and if I make an honest mistake in the serial number, I will have a registration certificate that does not reflect the serial number on that firearm. We have been told here by the Justice officials that in spite of a registration certificate not carrying the same serial number as the firearm, it's still going to be valid.

As I indicated strongly on more than one occasion, I find that a real stretch. I also find it very difficult. If my firearm is stolen and it ends up at the scene of a crime in Vancouver, you run it through your system and it shows up negative. It has to show up negative because the right serial number has not been filed as the result of an honest mistake. How do you get it back to me?

• 1550

We were told by the Justice officials we'd have to resort to traditional investigative methods. So it means that the registration system is not going to provide the kind of services to police departments that we were originally promised. So we are spending millions and millions of dollars on this system and because of a lack of verification at the point of entry, we don't know whether or not the information going into the system is reliable or not.

If the information going into the system is not reliable, as suggested by the chief firearms officer this morning, how can the registration certificate that is created from that unreliable information be reliable?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: I'm not sure there's enough time left to answer that. To start where you started, Mr. Ramsay, we run a country based on trusting people to submit their income tax data. We have verifications or audits down the road. We could probably assume that most Canadians are going to do their best to abide by this.

If a person happens to make a mistake and that weapon ends up in some other province, yes, that would pose some difficulty in trying to pull it out of the system because of the faulty number. I'm not at all convinced that this is going to be a tremendous number of firearms. And to not proceed with the system because there might be some errors in transposing numbers, which certainly can happen very innocently, given other systems that work using that kind of thing, I don't believe the numbers will be terribly significant. When it does occur, then clearly we're back to traditional investigative methods.

An investigation isn't based on one piece of information or one source of information. Investigations that get complex involve several sources. This system can cut out the need for a tremendous amount of investigation by police services across this country when the first verification shows that the person was in fact able to transpose the numbers properly and the firearm is properly registered. You can then get to the source of that firearm.

I have considerable faith in Canadians and their ability to deal with documents.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: I'm out of time, am I?

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Yes, Mr. Ramsay.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: It's not very convincing, but I'll accept that. Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Monsieur Lefebvre.

[Translation]

Mr. Réjean Lefebvre (Champlain, BQ): I know that there is a postal strike going on, but do you think that there could be a way of sending firearms through the mail? If not, how could we go about shipping prohibited or restricted firearms?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: I did not understand the question very well. Are you talking about the postal strike?

Mr. Réjean Lefebvre: No. Do you think that it could be possible to ship restricted firearms through the mail? Are there any other security concerns regarding these firearms?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: There are many safety problems and sources of concern. However, a registry system should provide a certain amount of protection to the Canadians who deserve our support.

[English]

Mr. Derek Lee: Can I ask a question about the verification procedure? As it is planned now, there is no distinction made between long guns and restricted or prohibited firearms in terms of verification. They will simply be verified, as I understand it, when they show up on the Richter scale, which is when a transfer takes place, when they're stolen possibly, when they're recovered, I suppose.

• 1555

You have suggested that we make a special case for the restricted and prohibited firearms and we get them verified quickly. What puzzled me was that I would have thought all of the restricted and prohibited firearms would already be in the database now, except those that are illegally held. Am I wrong in that?

Chief Brian Ford (Chair, Law Amendments Committee, Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police): There are some restricted weapons that may not be in there, that may not be quite black-and-white illegal.

I was thinking back on Mr. Ramsay's first question. I registered firearms for quite a while when I was a constable and a sergeant within the police service. A lot of people brought firearms back from the war. We still get them even now from people who, for one reason or another, have neglected...in most cases now it's because their father or grandfather has passed away and when going through the effects they find a firearm. It happens on quite a regular basis.

Most restricted weapons are part of the database on the CPIC computer at the centre for firearms at the RCMP. They're fairly well all registered. There may be some, such as those that have come into the country sort of illegally but not really somebody doing something with a mens rea intentionally illegally. People bring things back. They might have been in Bosnia or Vietnam or whatever the case may be and they might have just stuck them in as a souvenir without even thinking about it.

The armed forces have been involved in a number of conflicts. Sometimes they come back through that way into the country and people don't know about it; they find out later. Or they forget about them; they're in the bottom of a duffel bag or whatever the case may be. For the most part they're registered.

Mr. Derek Lee: With the bottom of the duffel bag exception, the vast majority of the non-long arms are already going to be on a database. When they are registered in the new law, will anyone attempt to match the new registration with the previous registration?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: What's happening here I think is that with the consultation, with the attempt to meet competing needs, an anomaly has crept into the regulations. A handgun today would be verified. A handgun tomorrow might not be. There might be a five-year period where they're not and you might end up with some Saturday night specials out there.

That's really what we're trying to say. We want to maintain the status quo with respect to prohibiting restricted weapons. We don't want that anomaly to occur for the safety of Canadians. We don't want handguns out there that are not being verified.

Mr. Derek Lee: I think I understand it better now. Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. Ramsay, you have three minutes.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Just to be fair, I should tell you why I didn't find your response that convincing. It's because of what we have in the handgun registration system now; to me too high a percentage of the information in that system is useless information. Errors have crept in over a period of time, and bear in mind that peace officers are the ones who verify the information before it goes into the system. I understand there's a lot of errors that creep in as a result of people transferring from place to place. They don't notify the system that they've been transferred.

Bearing in mind that the failure to register a firearm under this new legislation carries three offences or penalties, ranging from a summary conviction offence to an indictable offence with a 10-year maximum penalty, it is fairly serious for me to unknowingly be in possession of a registration certificate that doesn't match my firearm.

• 1600

We were told here last week by Justice officials that a registration certificate that doesn't match the identifying features, specifically the serial number, would still be a valid registration certificate, which I find hard to understand.

What in your mind registers a firearm if it isn't a certificate that corresponds with the identifying features on the firearm? Are we not placing gun owners in a precarious situation if, through their own failure to accurately put the 10 identifying features on that form, we then have them in possession of a certificate that does not in fact match the information on the firearm? Is that person not in violation of the statute? In other words, has the process and the administration met the requirements of the statute in that case?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: Mr. Ramsay, you have to look at it in practical terms. When the constable comes across the firearm and they see that an individual has made an honest attempt at registering it, he has called it a Winchester, and he has most of the number right...it's really a rifle and not a shotgun and discretion is there. In order to prove a case you have to show a mind that wanted to do something wrong. If the individual you're speaking of was able to correctly describe the make of the firearm, the fact that it was a rifle, not a shotgun, and that individual makes a mistake with one or two numbers of the serial number....

Remember, most people can write down the numbers correctly. It's up to the constable to then look at that and say, do I have a problem here or does the individual have a problem? We use police discretion for all sorts of offences, for all sorts of incidents where we decide there's really no offence there.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: With respect, I'm not talking about discretion. The question I would like you to focus on is whether or not the requirements of the statute have been met if that situation I described arose. We can discuss discretion later. If I receive a registration certificate that does not match my serial number, have I registered my firearm according to the requirements of the statute? Has it been met?

Mr. Brian McConnell: Given the way you've rephrased the question and the direction you've given me with respect to my answer, the only person you can really ask that question of is a chief firearms officer and not the executive director of the CACP.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thanks, Mr. Ramsay. We'll have to move on.

Ms. Bakopanos.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos (Ahuntsic, Lib.): Thank you.

I just want to pick up on the verification for prohibited and restricted weapons again. You were very clear in saying that there is no justification for a delay. When you answered my colleague's question you also tried to give us a picture of why. Since it touches on only less than 1% of the population, because they're all registered it's a matter of verification, not registration, and they will all be caught within the system by the year 2003. If they exchange hands or even if they don't, they have to get back into the verification system. What is the main reason you would like it done now and not later?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: It's a fear that handguns are, quite honestly, easily trafficked. The availability of handguns has been well controlled. The system works with respect to handguns. The different city studies have actually shown that. A very small percentage of firearms recovered in incidents are handguns. It's something that we currently have the control of. To have a window of opportunity, if you like, for tragedies to occur when they don't need to.... I would find it personally sad if that was allowed to simply slip through the cracks.

• 1605

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: Just to be precise, at the present time, if I have a handgun and I've registered it and I shoot somebody, you can trace it to me. So you can?

So there are no weapons out there that we cannot trace—outside of illegal ones. We're talking about those that are registered. That's why I asked what percentage of the population we are really talking about. Just to be precise, we can now trace a handgun to the owner with the present system.

Mr. Bryan McConnell: Yes.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. Ramsay, one quick minute. This is a bonus minute, not a Ramsay minute.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: To follow up where we left off, I always thought it was the investigating peace officer at the scene who decided whether the statute was complied with or not. If a charge was laid, of course the court would then determine it. So I have to ask you again, do you not feel it is the responsibility of the peace officer at the scene to determine whether the statute has been complied with or not?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: I very much do, but that was the original answer I was giving you, Mr. Ramsay—that the constable on the scene has to look at that and make a determination in his or her own mind as to whether the statute has been complied with. That's where the discretion flows.

If the constable decides that there in fact is a problem, and doesn't in some person's view make wise use of their discretion, then the crown counsel gets to look at that and gets to decide whether in fact there is really an offence there or not—whether there is an intention to commit an offence.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Yes. We're getting into the issue of discretion and we're getting away from the statutory requirement. Maybe I shouldn't be asking you this question. Maybe we should be asking whoever is responsible for the technicalities of this system, but surely someone has to be satisfied that the requirements of the statute have been met.

If I have a registration certificate that does not match my firearm, that's a prima facie case of having an unregistered firearm. Yes, I may explain what I had to do with it, and the police may take that into consideration. But the fact of the matter is that I'm out hunting with a firearm that is not, on the face of it, registered within the system.

Aside from the discretion the police might have in dealing with that, are we not facing that kind of situation when we have unverified information going into the system, and upon that information the certificate is being—

Mr. Bryan McConnell: I honestly cannot agree with that. If, as you say, you're out hunting and you have a firearm that is improperly registered, if you like, or that there was an error in the registration of, you're already in a situation where you're now going to be verified. You're describing a situation where somebody is saying to you, hey, you have a firearm here that is not the one you have the certificate for. In other words, you're in the process of being verified, Mr. Ramsay.

You could be driving a car where the VIN isn't really the one that's on your registration. I mean, that situation can exist.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: But you can't be charged with a criminal offence for doing that.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): We're out of time, Mr. Ramsay.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. Lefebvre—you'll pass?

Mr. McKay, you're coming in cold on this. Do you want to pass, or do you have a quick question for the witnesses?

Mr. Peter MacKay (Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough, PC): No, I'll have a quick go at them.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): We're on a one-minute round, as a matter of fact.

Mr. Peter McKay: Just a quick question—I just picked up on the tail end of what Mr. Ramsay was discussing.

You're saying that in the discretionary role of the Crown there would be consultation with the police. As in most cases, they would be saying, okay, was there a mens rea here—a criminal intent? Well, in the instance of a person providing improper information, there is already a section in the Criminal Code dealing with that.

Are you saying that discretion would be made by the Crown in conjunction with the police? Or are the police themselves going to be deciding whether or not to charge?

• 1610

Mr. Bryan McConnell: Mr. MacKay, that reflected back on an earlier partial answer that I gave. I know you're a former prosecutor, probably from a province where even to lay a charge you had to have Crown approval, but it was really to say that the constable has discretion. When the constable comes across a certain fact set... A constable might find somebody in possession of counterfeit money—as Mr. Ramsay said, there are prima facie cases—and might say this poor person received this counterfeit bill unknowingly. The same kind of discretion is involved.

If a person describes the firearm on the mail-in registration—which is pretty user-friendly—as a Winchester rifle of a certain calibre with a serial number, and he's found with a shotgun that has no resemblance to the other firearm, then discretion probably says we're heading for the Crown. But if it's very much what the certificate said, then perhaps the person has made an honest mistake. That's what I'm saying about discretion.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Okay.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. MacKay.

Mr. Lee, you had one. It's a one-minute round.

Mr. Derek Lee: Thank you.

I'm getting back to this verification process again. Where someone has a currently registered restricted firearm and they follow the process for the new registration, if the details on the new application match the existing registered firearm, would you have any objection to there being no need for a verification if the process simply sent back the documents that said you're verified and you're done? If they didn't match, most of the people who own these firearms would be the first ones to want to correct it. Do you think that process would work?

Mr. Bryan McConnell: Verification is sort of a one-time thing, so what you're really saying is that it's already been verified, so why verify it a second time? My gut reaction is that if it's been verified once then it probably doesn't serve much purpose to verify it a second time, but I say that with reserve.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. McConnell.

Thank you very much for coming, gentlemen, especially Chief Ford. Since you're not feeling so well, I appreciate your attendance.

We will have a three-minute break and then move things along here.

• 1612

• 1617

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): I would like to welcome members from the Coalition for Gun Control. We have with us today Wendy Cukier, Arn Snyder and Heidi Rathjen. Welcome.

[Translation]

Ms. Heidi Rathjen (Vice-Chair, Coalition for Gun Control): Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen of the committee, good day. My name is Heidi Rathjen and I'm vice-chair of the Coalition for Gun Control. I'm accompanied by Wendy Cukier, the chair, and by Arn Snyder from the Canadian Criminal Justice Association.

The Coalition represents more than 400 local, provincial and national organizations on the question of gun control, and among them are the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, the Canadian Bar Association, the Canadian Public Health Association and the Canadian Federation of Municipalities.

We've been working for nearly eight years now to obtain an efficient control of firearms in Canada and we intend to continue until the act is sufficiently strict, totally implemented and safe from the pressures brought to bear by our opponents. We have reached the stage where regulations are being drafted which, in our view, largely determine the strength and the efficiency of the Act.

I would now like to give the floor to Ms. Wendy Cukier, who will present our position on this most recent series of regulations.

[English]

Ms. Wendy Cukier (President, Coalition for Gun Control): Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. We are pleased to be here today. We will try to be as brief as possible to allow ample time for questions. Our brief is particularly brief, for those of you who have seen our papers on the past. What we tried to focus on specifically are the regulations and our position on those regulations. However, it is perhaps worth making a couple of introductory remarks, particularly for the members of the committee who have not previously been involved with the issue in any great detail, and particularly given some of the comments that I understand were made by other witnesses before the committee.

You again heard from the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police about the centrality of registration to the new firearms regime, particularly the registration of rifles and shotguns, given the fact that rifles and shotguns are the firearms most often recovered in crime in this country, and that rifles and shotguns are the firearms most often used to kill. You have also heard from the police about the importance of linking registration and licensing and how registration will assist with police investigations.

However, one point not emphasized that I think bears mentioning is the fact that the new Canadian gun control law, particularly the registration and licensing provisions that these regulations will give force to, really brings Canada in line with what is in place in most industrialized countries in the world. I think that point bears emphasizing, given the fact that what we are doing is not revolutionary and is not particularly new.

• 1620

Most industrialized countries in the world register rifles and shotguns and license gun owners. As you know, the United Nations Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice passed a series of resolutions recommending that countries that have not already done so license gun owners, register firearms and ensure that safe storage provisions are implemented. You've also recently heard about the OAS convention, which talked about the importance of being able to trace firearms in order to prevent smuggling.

I want to emphasize those points but also to address one of the misconceptions that we hear time and time again, which is that this law, this initiative, is being driven primarily by urban interests, by the Toronto-Montreal nexus. If you look at the data—I'll draw your attention to the first appendix to our brief, which has a little graph.

I want to emphasize once again that there's a direct relationship between access to firearms and firearms death and injury, not just in Canada but in industrialized countries. You will see that at the very top of the graph are the Northwest Territories and the Yukon, and next is the United States. Then we come to Alberta, Saskatchewan, the Maritimes and Quebec, and Ontario is actually quite low.

One of the terrible ironies in this debate is that the places that have the highest rates of gun ownership also have the highest rates of gun death. The places that have the highest rates of gun ownership also have the most opposition to gun control. That is a tragic irony that we seem to encounter time and time again.

With those preliminary comments on the importance of this legislation, and in particular the licensing and registration provisions, I want to walk through some of the key points in our brief.

The firearms registration certificates, which are described in the new set of regulations, are critical to bringing the act into force, and a number of concessions and compromises have been struck through the process to try to make this system as user-friendly and painless as possible. As most of the people around this table are aware, this legislation faced tremendous opposition from people who said it would be too expensive, too burdensome, too difficult and too inconvenient.

Our position is that the process set out for registration certificates seems to be an appropriate compromise, and we support the provisions that have been made. It may not be perfect, there may be opportunities for deliberate or inadvertent errors to creep in, and it's true that stickers can be scraped off guns. But in our assessment, this is a reasonable compromise that balances the concerns for public safety with the concerns of law-abiding gun owners, and we support the regulations as written.

As far as the amendments to the transfer of firearms are concerned, it's interesting that we've heard such passionate calls for improved accuracy and verification in the registration system. While on one level we would support the ideal that we want absolutely accurate information in the registration system, we feel that some concessions have been made and some compromises struck, and that on balance the approach taken with these regulations is not unreasonable.

We think that delaying the verification of long arms, while not desirable, is acceptable. However, delaying the verification of restricted and prohibited weapons simply is not, and we have inferred that was perhaps an inadvertent consequence. While concerns have been expressed by owners of long guns, particularly in rural areas and perhaps the west—and not wanting to make that part of the system burdensome—putting off the verification on transfer seems to be a reasonable compromise. However, I would suggest to you that restricted and prohibited weapons have been verified in recent years. We're not asking for anything more than we currently have in place, but we are very clearly saying that we do not want to accept anything less.

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I think it would be a big mistake to not address the concerns that have been raised by a number of people around the table. So we don't oppose the delay in the verification of long arms until 2003, but we would suggest you look at a way to make the regulations very specific where it comes to verification of handguns and prohibited weapons.

As an aside, I will note that even the Government of Alberta, which has been rather veracious in its opposition to the licensing and registration of long guns, made it very clear that handguns, by their very nature, are dangerous and need to be strictly controlled. I would refer you all to the Government of Alberta factum on the particular issue with respect to handguns and the need for very strict controls on restricted weapons in this country.

I'll now turn it over to my colleague, Arn Snyder, from the Canadian Criminal Justice Association, who will talk about shooting clubs and ranges.

Mr. Arn Snyder (Canadian Criminal Justice Association): Thank you, Wendy.

One of the elements that are in the regulations concerns shooting clubs and ranges, and we're pleased that there are now regulations in that area. We're pleased for three reasons.

First and most important, ranges and gun clubs are places where unlicensed individuals can gain access to both restricted and unrestricted weapons as guest members of the club. Adherence to safety rules is critical and controls on consumption of alcohol, etc., are important.

The second reason in terms of regulation of gun clubs is that membership in a gun club is one criterion that will enable an individual to acquire a restricted weapon such as a handgun, and the screening processes and record keeping in gun clubs are critical to ensuring the effectiveness of controls on restricted weapons.

Third, regulation of gun clubs is critical because they are places where quantities of weapons are stored. There have been a number of firearms thefts from gun clubs, so the importance of their regulation cannot be overemphasized.

Those are the three reasons why we're pleased that there are regulations on shooting clubs.

Interestingly, section 13 of the act indicates that the operator of an approved shooting club shall keep records that include, with respect to each member of the club, the name, address, phone number and so on. One thing we feel is more of an oversight is that there is no requirement with regard to keeping records of guests, because under subsection 14(2) there's a requirement for the operator of an approved shooting club to keep information with regard to guests. We feel the regulation should be amended to require that a record of guests is maintained at gun clubs and shooting ranges, and that's for the three reasons I previously mentioned.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Those are the two areas of regulation we are primarily concerned about, as you'll see with respect to gun shows, public agent firearms regulations, special authority to possess regulations and the delay in implementation. We had proposed no changes.

Under the import and export of firearms, our understanding was that a written declaration will be required at the border as to the types of numbers of firearms coming through the border. The information required will correspond to that provided for registration, and in cases of non-compliance with the declaration the firearms in question may be either disposed of or reserved for the use of customs officers or police.

We heard quite late today that we may have not correctly interpreted the import-export of firearms. If we haven't interpreted it correctly, that was certainly the intention we understood those regulations were serving. We think it's critically important that firearms be registered as they come into the country. And if through the process of making some minor amendments that has changed, then I would defer to some of my more learned colleagues, who have made presentations before, and say that perhaps this needs to be examined by the committee.

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Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Ms. Cukier.

Mr. Ramsay, you have five minutes.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wish to welcome our witnesses, and, of course, thank them for their presentation.

I always thought that the mail-in registration system, which creates this problem with verification, was brought in to keep the costs down. If you're going to mobilize 3 million to 6 million Canadians to register anywhere from 7 million to 20 million long guns, it would be an enormous effort. They'd have to bring them into a verifier, and in most cases someone who's been trained in firearms identification. So that's just an opening comment.

Now, this system is saying that the verification of a long gun will never occur until a transfer takes place, until someone wants to sell their firearm, or until they die and it's part of the estate. Then verification will have to occur at the change of ownership.

So I would think we're going to have a large percentage—well, a significant percentage, if I might be more conservative—of the firearms that go.... And some of the testimony here by the RCMP admits it will be years, if not decades, before verification occurs. If we're going to spend that kind of money on a registration system, it should be a sound system from the beginning. I have great concerns, as I always have with the mail-in system, that this would not be the case.

I would like to ask Mr. Snyder a question, as he dealt with the gun clubs and gun shows. There was a recent and unfortunate suicide at a gun club out in B.C. How would these regulations have prevented that? Or would it have prevented it?

Mr. Arn Snyder: Mr. Ramsay, I'm not that familiar with that incident itself, and I don't think I could adequately respond. But in terms of ensuring better safety regulations, and also safety procedures on a range or in a club, I think these regulations go a long way toward doing that.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Well, was there a problem? Perhaps you could tell us how many gun clubs you have visited. Has there been a problem with the procedures at the gun clubs?

The insurance rate is so very low. There does not seem to be a history of a situation arising where these gun clubs create a threat to public safety. Is there a problem across the country with gun clubs creating a safety problem that needs to be regulated?

Mr. Arn Snyder: At this point, my knowledge is limited to a number of gun clubs around this area. I guess I'd respond to any improvement in the safety area. Any improvement in a safety procedure area is one that I would support, and it is important to encourage. I can't make an evaluation in terms of the instance.

I don't know if Wendy can, or if she wants to.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: I think it's fair to say that many gun clubs have exemplary records of safety, and many don't. The Barnett Rifle Club, which, if I'm not mistaken, is Professor Gary Mauser's gun club, was the gun club that gave Mark Chahal his firearms permit. It was the gun club where the woman committed suicide, and I believe it is where a gun club member just fatally injured himself accidentally.

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So the notion that gun clubs are safe havens has not been supported by the experience we've had with a number of fairly high-profile murders where people were in fact members of gun clubs. Clearly, as you have been fond of saying, you can't legislate against insanity. But you can reduce the likelihood that people who present a risk will get access to firearms, will become members of gun clubs, and will get restricted weapons permits.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: How would these regulations reduce the likelihood of those incidents occurring at that particular gun club you've mentioned?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Well, I think if there is more accountability.... I mean, my basic principle with respect to firearms control—

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Can you be specific?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Mr. Ramsay, we know that in general where you have stricter control you have fewer crimes, you have fewer deaths. It's very difficult to identify specific examples.

But in the case of Mark Chahal, for instance, there were some concerns raised about the regularity with which he actually went and target-shot. Those are some of the things people have talked about in terms of requiring that people with restricted firearms permits are members in good standing of gun clubs.

In order to ensure that they are members of good standing, we have to ensure that there is adequate record keeping in gun clubs. I think the regulations that are proposed are reasonable, given the risk posed, in particular, by restricted firearms.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. de Savoye.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye (Portneuf, BQ): Ms. Cukier, Ms. Rathjen, Mr. Snyder, do you understand French?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: A little.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Interpretation has been provided for you in return for your tax dollars.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Thank you.

[English]

Yours too, I hope.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Ms. Cukier, when the representatives of the Department of Justice handed you the new set of regulations, they also informed you about some other documents that they were filing at the same time, and among them is an authorization for Canada Post to deliver firearms in the same way as any other merchandise, for all practical purposes, which means that there would be no specific requirements regarding their transportation or their storage. What is your reaction to this? Do you consider it as a danger or is it something quite normal in your mind?

One of the concerns I expressed to Department of Justice officials, but I am not sure whether I was right or not, is that if it becomes easy to send firearms through the mail, this might lead to abuse and could even entail a certain number of risks. What is your opinion, Ms. Cukier?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Excuse-me, but I do not speak French very well.

[English]

Mr. de Savoye: You go right ahead.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: I agree with you that transporting firearms through the mail does present certain risks. At the same time, we know there are many areas in Canada where there are very legitimate and pressing needs for access to firearms, and where there is perhaps not as easy access to them as in other parts of the country.

So, again, this is an issue where presumably people try to balance the needs against the risks. And to be perfectly honest, Monsieur de Savoye, I haven't looked at this issue in detail, but we will take it under advisement, and perhaps have a more detailed response. Thank you.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I thank you for taking an interest in this question.

On another topic I'd like to get back to the question raised by my colleague, namely gun clubs and firing ranges. You are recommending that the regulations be amended so that gun clubs would have to keep information about their guests on file. I have a problem with this, and perhaps you have the right answer.

If we keep records about guests, it is not for the mere pleasure of filling shelves or filing cabinets. I imagine that this information will have to be relayed. To what extent are we thus infringing on the individual's right to privacy? If I am invited to a gun club, whose business is that? If I am invited to a gun club, what will be done with the information that has been collected about me: I was there on a certain day, at a certain time, with a certain person who invited me there and I did this or that?

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I would guess that as soon as this information is collected, it will be recorded and used. Sometimes this concerns me. Would you be able to reassure me about this, Ms. Cukier?

[English]

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Well, I can't reassure you entirely, but I must say again that I share your concerns that we do all have rights to privacy.

I think the intention of our proposed amendment relates to subsection 14(2), which says:

The operator of an approved shooting club shall, on the request of a chief firearms officer or a guest of a current or past member or officer of the shooting club...supply a written description of the guest's participation, if any, in target practice or target shooting competitions within the previous five years.

Our concern is how we can ask the operator of the approved shooting club to provide that information if there is no requirement to keep a record. When I visit a friend's fitness club, I sign in.

We're not talking about submitting that information to the firearms officer, but the regulations clearly allow for that information to be requested. Our concern is that if there's no requirement to keep that information, how can they comply with this portion of the regulations?

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Ms. Cukier, the message I'm getting is that you are afraid that the people responsible for providing certain information will not go to the trouble of keeping proper records. I see that this is what this is all about. I thought that you wanted to go beyond the law and that you wanted additional information to be kept. This is simply about complying with the requirements of the law, just as any business person has to do his accounting to ensure that the tax man gets more than his due.

[English]

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Yes. I think the regulations do specify that the operator of the shooting club must keep records with respect to each member of the club, but there's nothing that says anything about keeping records with respect to guests.

I'll go back to what my colleague said about the particular risks presented at clubs where people have access to restricted weapons. We've had a number of cases of serious thefts and crimes being committed on gun club premises by guests. We think that some sort of formal record keeping with respect to guests is important.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. MacKay.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to welcome all the guests here, as well.

One question I'd like to ask you at the outset is, what sort of consultation did you have with members of the Department of Justice? We've heard a number of complaints from a number of the witnesses here today, including the chief of the first nations, that they did not feel satisfied with the consultation they've had within the department. I wonder if you could just briefly tell us what consultation process took place as far as you were concerned.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: We were invited to one meeting to talk about the regulations, and we had a number of conference calls. But I believe there was one formal meeting where we were asked to bring in members of the coalition to talk about some of the concerns we had with respect to the regulations.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Okay.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: From our perspective, that was satisfactory.

Mr. Peter MacKay: You were satisfied with your consultation. Thank you.

One of the premises that you have in your submissions to the committee is on page 3:

Although most gun owners are law abiding and will comply with the registration requirements, elements of the gun lobby have for some time been advocating non-compliance and deliberate omission of information.

If in that statement you are acknowledging that for the most part there are legitimate gun owners out there, there are gun clubs, there are people who are using these weapons without causing any disruption to the lives of any other citizens, and these registration aims are not so much about safety concerns but more about gaining knowledge and information to be used for other purposes—

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Ms. Wendy Cukier: If you're proposing that we're.... I mean, from my perspective, the information is directly related to improving public safety. I think that point has been made over and over by the police. Without information about who owns what guns, we have no control, we can't take preventative measures, etc.

In the same way that all of us have driver's licenses and register our cars because we are law-abiding citizens, and we comply with spot checks at Christmas time because we are law-abiding citizens, I believe that most gun owners—one at the table—will comply with the regulations. However, we also know there are certain elements who are deliberately trying to undermine them.

One of the strongest indications that we have confidence in the average Canadian gun owner is the fact that we do support self-reported registration for the most part, with verification only on sales and transfers. This is to make it as simple as possible for those law-abiding gun owners to comply in the same way as our income tax system makes the assumption that most Canadians are law-abiding, but has provisions built in to catch people who aren't.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Well, if that is the position, then why criminalize what is up to this point a legitimate activity or recreation? Why make it a criminal offence?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Are you talking about possession of an unregistered firearm?

Mr. Peter MacKay: Yes, a long gun.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: In the same way as non-payment of the GST became an offence, for which there were a variety of sanctions, failure to register a firearm presents us with a variety of sanctions, some of which are not criminal and some of which are. I think the sanctions that have been put in place are appropriate, given the very significant risk to Canadians represented by firearms.

Mr. Peter MacKay: But you've just said there is a majority—and I'm using your line here—that most or, in my opinion, the majority are not posing a risk.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Right, and so most will not become criminals, because most will comply with the law, because law-abiding citizens by definition obey the law.

I would suggest to you that you are right, most Canadians are law-abiding, and therefore they will not be criminalized, because they will comply with the law.

Mr. Peter MacKay: But those who don't will face criminal sanctions.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: As you know, there are a range of sanctions. One of the responses...and I think Mr. McConnell said it is quite possible. With our income tax, if we make a mistake and they catch us, they'll say fix this and pay some more money. At the lowest level of non-compliance, if they think you've made an honest mistake, they'll just say fix it. The second level for first-time failure to register is potentially a $2,000 fine and six months, and then the sanctions escalate.

What is interesting is that we had a noted defence lawyer, Clayton Ruby, say that in his opinion deterrence measures really only work with law-abiding citizens. He very strongly supported the sanctions that were introduced in order to ensure compliance with registration of firearms.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Well, I would certainly agree, because I don't think the registration guidelines are going to affect the criminal element one iota.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Yes, I was surprised to receive your letter saying that given that the majority of firearms recovered in crime are rifles and shotguns.... So I have a bit of a disconnect.

Mr. Peter MacKay: That are unregistered.

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen (Windsor—St. Clair, Lib.): They've never been registered.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: If we look at Halifax and Dartmouth, for example, places where the police have been particularly supportive of this legislation, what we find is that of the firearms involved in crime in 1993, 86% were rifles and shotguns.

Now, those aren't guns that have been smuggled. Typically those are guns that have been acquired legally and are misused.

Our basic premise is that if people are held accountable for their firearms, we will reduce the likelihood of them being misused or falling into criminal hands. That's why, particularly for places outside the major centres, which clearly do have smuggling problems, it surprises me that you wouldn't see the connection.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Well—

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. MacKay, you are out of time. Mr. Telegdi.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi (Kitchener—Waterloo, Lib.): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I want to applaud you on your brief and also the work you have done in this area to raise awareness and to try in some ways to change the culture. One only has to look down to the United States and see the various militia groups that love getting together on the weekend and using whatever firearms they can get their hands on. As a matter of fact, I'm waiting for them to make the case that they should be able to use high-explosive bombs, which they have been using, and somehow make it seem like it's all patriotic.

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The fact of the matter is that we are dealing with weapons that, in the wrong hands, can cause a great deal of harm. If there are restrictions associated with that, well, so be it.

I'm very pleased that Kitchener-Waterloo councils were both in support. I can recall when not too many years ago an individual going to work at Ontario Glove lost it. He went in there with a gun, and he gunned people down.

I don't want to have a culture where we are all supposed to have our God-given rights to carry firearms, particularly if you look at the media in Ontario right now, where the latest thing is road rage—that's people getting upset with other drivers. Thank God it's not common in Canada that you can have a shotgun, a handgun or a rifle above the dash, with which you might want to blow away somebody, somebody you might get upset with on the road.

So I commend you on your work, and I certainly have no trouble with the politics of this issue, because it's the right thing to do. I can also tell you that in the last election in my area we were opposed by everyone who somehow thought we had a God-given right to bear arms, and it didn't sell.

I think you helped very much in creating that kind of culture. For that I commend you, because too many people get hurt by somebody else's sport.

Let me also say that there could have been many raids in the past. It happens right across this country when the police can go and raid a motorcycle club. Since there isn't registration on the long guns, they really do not know whether they are stolen or not stolen.

If we're going to have any control on this issue, which I think is a serious issue given that we're not too far away from the United States—as far as I'm concerned, it has a totally perverse culture pertaining to guns—if we're going to get a real handle on it, the work you do is very important. You certainly have many defenders, many supporters in your efforts right here in Parliament, so thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Perhaps we could have one quick round of one minute, questions and answers. Very quick, sir.

Mr. Jack Ramsay: Most of the gun owners I've talked to are very safety conscious. They oppose this legislation because they do not see it having the capacity to increase the safety of our homes and our streets.

I would ask Mr. Snyder one quick question. When we look at the program that's being brought forward to accomplish the enhanced safety, we see so many indicators that it will not do what it's supposed to do. Let me just quickly ask you, then, if you're a firearm owner—and apparently you are—and you own one of those firearms on which you have to put a sticker, because there is no serial number, or it has a similar serial number.... If someone steals that from you and runs it across an emery for 35 seconds, or how long it takes to wipe it off, if the police apprehend you, how in the world can they trace that back to its owner? Perhaps they simply find it at the scene of the crime. How can they trace it back to the owner?

You see, the point I'm making is that if we're going to spend millions of dollars on this system, it should work, and it should provide safety. But just that simple example shows at least....

I'd like to hear your answer, and if it—

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Could we have an answer, please?

Mr. Arn Snyder: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a couple of comments.

First, I think most of the firearms we're talking about—90% in fact—have some identifiable number on them. We're looking at 10%.

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To echo previous comments, in some ways we are looking at a compromise to this legislation. Yes, there is a possibility the sticker can be taken off, and once it is off, the question is how the firearm can be identified. Listening to the previous presenters and getting back to traditional investigative techniques may well be the way you have to go.

That is the way I would see this legislation. There is not 100% accuracy in this process, but in my view it is very much better than what exists now.

I am a gun owner. I have also been a police officer for 25 years, and that is the other side I am looking at. I see this piece of legislation and these regulations we are talking about today as being light years ahead of where we are now. I have to agree with you that there are loopholes in some areas, but that is the reality of the piece of legislation.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Snyder.

Mr. de Savoye.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Mr. Snyder, I noticed that you had documentation on the use of firearms for criminal purposes in certain regions of the country, such as in the Maritimes. Have you by chance any statistics for the Quebec region? If so, how does Quebec compare to the rest of the country?

Mr. Arn Snyder: I'm sorry, but I don't speak French.

[English]

We have some statistics with regard to Montreal and the specific area—

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Well, I was wondering about Quebec City.

Mr. Arn Snyder: Unfortunately, we do not have anything on Quebec City.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I'll write you a letter next time.

Mr. Arn Snyder: Thank you. We have Hull, if you wish.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: More specifically, Mr. Snyder, how does it compare with other regions of the country? Is it possible to explain the differences one way or the other?

[English]

Mr. Arn Snyder: I am not aware of any specific area in terms of explaining any differences. I don't know if one of the other members of the committee can explain the differences.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I believe that the lady wanted to answer my question.

[English]

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Very quickly, please.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: I think the misuse of firearms in Quebec is not substantially different from that in other provinces. You have heard from Dr. Chapdelaine that they are a problem.

One of the ways Quebec is definitely different from other parts of the country is in their cultural attitude to guns. Even in areas where there are high ownership levels of firearms, you don't see the kind of opposition we see in parts of the country that are more influenced by American values. As you know, support for this legislation is higher in Quebec than anywhere else in the country.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): A one-minute question and answer, please.

Mr. Peter MacKay: If the eradication of suicides, homicides, and domestic violence is really the ultimate goal of this type of legislation and if the cost associated with it is going to be about $48 million, which has been predicted but is ridiculously low—and that is going to be borne out, I would suggest, quite soon—would the money not be better spent on education or focusing directly on those issues rather than trying to register weapons, when there isn't that link?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: I think you have to look at this legislation as a package. We have argued that registration is an integral part and is absolutely essential. I will refer to my colleague Dr. Chapdelaine, who I believe referred to Ted Miller's study, which suggested that Canadians pay $6 billion a year for gunshot death and injury. In the context of $6 billion a year, this is a very small investment.

If you take the time to look at the range of groups that have endorsed the Coalition for Gun Control and this legislation, and they span the political spectrum as well as the country, I think it is very clear that most organizations whose primary objective is improving public safety and reducing gun death and injury believe this is a worthwhile investment.

• 1700

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you.

Ms. Bakopanos, you have one minute.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: I'd like to say a very quick thank you. I also want to congratulate the coalition for the work they've done in this area. I want to ask them a question on a comment they made on number 2, the amendment to transfer of firearms.

You are recommending that we modify the amendment to ensure that restricted weapons continue to be verified during the 1998-2003 period. I assume that is on transfer, first of all.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Yes.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: Second, you made a comment about the Government of Alberta agreeing on...would you like me to elaborate on that?

Ms. Wendy Cukier: I apologize, it was snarky. You may be aware that in its challenge to the constitutionality of the law the Government of Alberta tried to draw a distinction between handguns, which it considers to be inherently dangerous, and ordinary firearms—rifles and shotguns—which it considers to be merely tools. Of course we don't agree entirely with that distinction. But I was simply referring to the fact that even in Alberta there is agreement that restricted weapons pose a particular danger by virtue of their concealability, and I think any relaxation on the current regime for controlling restricted and prohibited weapons would be a grave error.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you. I appreciate the attendance this afternoon and the comments of the witnesses.

We will have a three-minute break and then we will start with our next set of witnesses.

Ms. Wendy Cukier: Thank you very much.

• 1701

• 1706

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): If everyone would take a seat, we can start.

We have from the YWCA of Canada, Sandra Essex and Gael MacLeod.

Ladies, the floor is yours.

Ms. Sandra Essex (Member, YWCA of Canada): Thank you very much. I'm representing the YWCA of Canada. My colleague Gael MacLeod is also from the YWCA.

The YWCA of Canada is a voluntary charitable women's organization established in 1893 to serve as a national co-ordinating body for 43 YWCA and YM-YWCA member associations in Canada. We provide high-quality community-based programs and services, are a source of public education on women's issues, and advocate for responsible social, political, and economic change. Our core mission is to seek equity and equality for all women. The YWCA is a worldwide movement, operating in 91 countries. We speak for 5 million women, making us the largest and oldest membership-based women's organization in the world.

In Canada the YWCA has worked with women and their families for over 100 years. Last year over 850,000 people participated in our programs and services. Some of the programs and services offered by the YW include programs to end violence against women, long-term supportive housing, emergency and short-term shelter, and non-profit housing.

We are here today to demonstrate the importance of the registration component of the regulations as they relate to domestic violence and women's safety.

The court of appeal in Alberta heard testimony from people claiming to be experts in the area of spousal and family violence. The experts claimed that there was no relationship between guns and domestic violence and domestic homicide and that gun control was not a women's safety issue. These statements are ludicrous and will not be supported by the YWCA, which has worked for over a century on women's issues.

Gun-related domestic homicides and spousal intimidation are a fact of life and death for many women in our country and were known to exist long before statistical data brought the evidence of these tragedies to public knowledge.

It is important for organizations and people who call themselves experts and give expert testimony to explain how their expertise is gained and how their expert opinion is formed. The YWCA's expertise on domestic violence comes from our grassroots involvement with programs to end violence against women and from the front-line work we do with women and children in our emergency housing services.

Daily, the YWCA assists women fleeing domestic violence by helping them access safe, affordable housing, legal aid, welfare, and other community services. We advocate for tougher laws against men who abuse their spouse and for changes to legislation affecting such issues as child custody and access, legal aid, and child support.

Our expertise comes from our long history of working on women's issues. Since the late 1800s we have housed women needing a safe place to stay. Last year over 12,000 women and children stayed in our emergency shelters across Canada. This does not include the 170,000 other women who used our residences, many of whom were also fleeing domestic abuse.

• 1710

We operate shelters in 12 of our member associations in such places as Winnipeg, Calgary, Peterborough, Sudbury, Brandon, Regina, Lethbridge, Kamloops, and Yellowknife. Daily, we help women rebuild their lives, which have been devastated by men who abuse and who use power and control to abuse. It is our daily work that has shaped our expert opinion on domestic violence.

Over the years the YWCA has contributed their expertise to a wide range of formal and informal consultations on violence against women. For example, for the last three years we have been an active participant in the Department of Justice's violence against women consultation.

This forum brings together 60 women's organizations considered to be experts on violence issues. The YWCA has used its expertise to provide input on legislation important to women, such as the access to sexual assault records, child support guidelines, and human rights legislation.

To help prevent and deal with violence the YWCA of Canada has published a series of documents entitled “Community Action on Violence Against Women” and has distributed these documents to tens of thousands of community agencies and health and social organizations and professionals.

The YWCA of Canada has organized for a second consecutive year the YWCA Week Without Violence—a national event, international event—to sensitize young people and adults to end violence in their daily lives.

The YWCA's expert opinion is also formed by our co-operative work with many other women's organizations and community groups. Our testimony to the House and Senate committee hearings on Bill C-68 focused on gun control and its relationship to domestic violence. It was prepared in consultation with many other women's organizations and endorsed by over 130 expert women's groups.

It is our opinion that mandatory registration, a key element of Bill C-68, will have a significant impact on domestic homicide and women's and children's safety.

Canada's strong gun control legislation and mandatory registration of all firearms makes a public statement. It helps shape our values by rejecting the gun culture so present in the United States. The gun culture romanticizes and legitimizes violence. Boys are exposed early in their lives to the use of weapons through games, movies, videos, and electronic games. They learn soon enough that conflict resolution through violence is not only effective but also gender appropriate.

In many communities, owning a gun and using it is not simply a protective measure against the environment. It represents the empowerment of a traditional male role in controlling his family and having the cultural right to do so.

Gun control will not solve domestic violence, which is rooted in the values of dominance, aggressiveness, and competitiveness. Violence against women is about power and control by the man over the woman. It will continue as long as there is an imbalance of economic, political, and social power between men and women.

The domestic violence experts who oppose stronger gun control are wrong when they claim there is no relationship between guns and domestic violence. There is clearly a relationship between a gun culture and the availability of guns. A gun culture that normalizes and legitimizes violence is also rooted in the values of aggressiveness and power. It is an extension of the same culture that perpetuates violence against women.

Strong gun control, which includes mandatory registration of all firearms, takes a stand against this culture and will have an impact on domestic violence. In homes where violence occurs, if guns are present they always become part of the abusive use of power, control, and intimidation, whether implicitly or explicitly.

Statistics Canada's landmark study in 1993 on violence against women showed that 51% of women over the age of 16 had been victims of physical or sexual assault as defined by the Criminal Code. This means over 5 million women experience violence. Twenty-five percent, or one in four women, experience violence in a current marriage or have experienced it in a past marriage.

Estimates have put the numbers of guns in Canada between 5 million and 7 million. When these statistics are taken together, it is clear that many more women are being intimated with guns than are coming forward to the police. Our shelter workers support this theory.

Of the total number of women killed, death at the hands of an intimate partner represented more than three-quarters. This is called intimate femicide. In almost half of domestic homicides, guns are the weapons of choice when men kill their spouse. Over 70% of the guns used are legally owned rifles and shotguns.

For the last 20 years research has consistently supported these facts. The statistics may vary slightly, but the trend does not. Investigation of all female homicides shows that the victim usually knows her assailant. Most frequently the murders take place in her home. Most women are not killed in random acts of violence. They are in far greater danger of being killed by someone they know who legally owns a rifle or shotgun.

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A registry would provide the police answering a domestic dispute with information on whether or not the home had firearms and on the type and number of guns present. This information would enable the police to remove a registered firearm from a volatile situation, likely preventing a future assault from escalating into a domestic homicide. It is important to have the gun removed as soon as possible as the violence usually escalates over time.

Our research shows women will return to an abusive partner 30 times before she finally leaves. Each time she returns, she risks her death from the firearm. The presence of a gun in an abusive home increases the likelihood of a domestic homicide.

Firearms are not the only weapons used for killing a spouse, but they are the most lethal. It is easier for a volatile situation like a domestic dispute to end in death when guns are available.

Research on homicides has shown it takes less intent, less determination and less effort to kill with a gun than any other method. Studies have shown that firearm assaults were 12 times more likely to result in death than non-firearm incidents. One study found that two-thirds of the investigating officers of domestic violence homicides believed the killing would not have occurred had the offender not had access to a firearm.

These observations may also explain why multiple victim homicides, such as the Vernon massacre, are much more likely to be committed with firearms. In almost a half of domestic homicides, a suicide or an attempted suicide follows the murder of the spouse. Other research puts the attempted suicide figure at 70%.

An analysis of 551 women killed by their partners between 1974 and 1990 indicated that 767 deaths resulted. Most of the additional victims were offenders who committed suicide, but 62 children were also killed. A man having just killed his wife will find it easier to kill others if he has a gun as opposed to another weapon.

Domestic homicide is usually an impulsive act that follows an assault or a perceived loss of control, such as when the woman threatens to leave. By connecting a name to a gun, registration will ensure gun owners are held accountable for their weapons. It will encourage safe storage and it will eliminate many impulsive domestic homicides. The three or four extra minutes it takes to unlock the gun and load it will determine life or death for women in many situations.

A registry will enable prohibition orders to be enforced. Over 17,000 orders are issued every year to individuals who pose a risk to public safety, forbidding them from having firearms. Many of these prohibition orders are against men convicted of assaulting their wives or others.

Front-line workers in our shelters tell us that women are regularly threatened with guns. The ability to issue and enforce prohibition orders contributes to the protection and safety of these women.

Statistics on domestic homicide indicate that 50% of the accused had a criminal record. These men should not have owned a gun. With registration, access to firearms could have been denied or the weapons confiscated in these cases. Without accurate knowledge of where the firearms are, the police cannot enforce the prohibition orders.

For many women abuse starts later in the marriage, perhaps after the birth of a child or when the marriage begins to break down or when a job is lost. These incidents do not cause the violence; they are simply a catalyst. By the time the violence begins, the abuser may already have legally acquired a gun. It may be well into the cycle of violence before the police are involved.

With registration, police would have information about the existence of the gun and they could remove it on their first visit. Removal won't eliminate the violence, but it will decrease the likelihood of the abuse ending in a homicide. Registration will not eliminate violence, but reducing access to firearms by men who are violent may decrease the extent of the injury to the woman and prevent an assault from becoming a homicide.

Ms. Gael MacLeod (YWCA of Canada): The YWCA appreciates the opportunity to present to the committee on behalf of many women. As women are generally underrepresented in Canada's political institutions and public service, laws and policies do not always reflect women's priorities or meet their needs or concerns.

Gun control legislation in the past has not been tough enough because it was missing the mandatory registration of firearms. Women in our member associations and from other major women's groups have told us they support registration as a measure to strengthen gun control.

Polls done by Environics show that 90% of Canadians support the mandatory registration of all firearms. Women showed even higher levels of support. An Angus Reid poll in September 1993 found similar results: 81% of men supported the registration of all firearms; and again, women showed higher levels of support at 92%. Another Angus Reid poll, conducted in August 1994, found consistent results; 86% of Canadians favour the registration of all guns.

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Women have consistently told you through their MPs, through research polls and organizations like the YWCA that we want the mandatory registration of firearms.

Registration of firearms is the rule, not the exception, in most industrialized countries. In a recent resolution the United Nations Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice explicitly recognized the relevance of firearm regulation in addressing violence against women.

Recently, three separate inquests have recommended the registration of all firearms. The coroner's inquest into the Vernon massacre specifically recommended the registration of all firearms to prevent domestic homicide.

Registration is a cost-effective method of preventing firearm deaths and injuries, especially when you consider the costs of policing and social services, the community and human costs of another Vernon tragedy. The longer we delay and wait for proof of the value of registration, the more lives will be lost in domestic violence.

Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you. Mr. Breitkreuz, you have five minutes.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz (Yorkton—Melville, Ref.): Thank you very much. One of the things I'm doing here is listening very carefully to the response to the regulations that we have before us. That's really what we're examining.

I'm trying to gather information from the witnesses on how these regulations will in fact be effective. Perhaps you can give me some explanation on how you feel the registration will be effective.

One of the things you said is that the registration will change our culture. How?

Ms. Gael MacLeod: In the context that it was said, we were referring to the gun culture; we were referring to the culture of violence.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Can you connect the registration of firearms to that?

Ms. Sandra Essex: We can connect it as far as domestic violence is concerned.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: How do these regulations address that? Can you cite an example? It hasn't worked anywhere else, so why should it work in Canada?

Ms. Sandra Essex: You need to remember that we are here specifically speaking on domestic violence and how registration impacts on domestic violence. You have to remember in domestic violence situations the abusers tend to be men in most cases. Those men are perceived as law-abiding responsible citizens. It could be anybody in this room. They are not perceived as the criminal element. They are criminals once they abuse their spouse, but they're not perceived that way.

Those men who legally acquire guns...and women tend to be killed with legally owned rifles and shotguns. Often the cycle of violence doesn't start until well into the marriage. It could be 10 years into the marriage. If a registration process was in place, once the cycle of violence starts, if the person already has guns.... Often the woman can be abused 10 or 15 times before the police first come to the home.

I could go on for two hours about the culture of violence. That's one of the things that women's groups try to educate people on in the community all the time.

The thing is that by the time the police are involved, you are well into the cycle of violence. It is absolutely critical to have that legally owned rifle and shotgun removed from the home. I guarantee you it's already a part of the vicious cycle. It's already being used to intimidate her, to terrorize her. We have all kinds of examples we can give you from our shelters where the family dog is shot, where the man sleeps with a gun under the bed, where he cleans it in front of her, where she wakes up in the middle of the night and the gun is pointed at her head.

It will end in domestic homicide at some point because the cycle of violence escalates. We have to get that gun out of there. Registration is the tool that will remove that gun.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Mr. Chairman, do I have time for a supplementary question?

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Yes.

Ms. Sandra Essex: I'm sorry. I hope I answered your question.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Not really. I've talked to women in my home town. In looking at this issue and at the amount of money that's going to be spent on it and all of the things that will be involved, many of them say it would be much better if we took that money and spent it on women's crisis centres. That's why I find it surprising that you're promoting this, because as you know, rifles and shotguns are involved in a very small percentage of problem homes—

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Ms. Sandra Essex: I'm sorry, that just isn't so with domestic violence.

Ms. Gael MacLeod: No.

Ms. Sandra Essex: Again, we are here speaking to you about domestic violence.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: No, the point they're making is that if they have those resources available, they would be much more effective in counselling and crisis centres and all that kind of thing. Would you not agree that's—

Ms. Sandra Essex: Crisis centres and sexual assault centres are another piece of the work that needs to be done. Simply giving all the money to sexual assault centres, or to the YWCA—which would be wonderful—isn't going to address the problem either. There needs to be a full range. Gun control is a piece of it. There needs to be education and things happening in the school. There needs to be sexual assault centres and community consultations. It's a piece of it, although a very important piece of it.

I need to correct your statement. Rifles and shotguns, not handguns, are the guns primarily used to kill women, and they're legally owned by those who shoot them.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: That's not what I said. I said that they are involved in a very small percentage of the domestic violence situations. They're not a factor in the majority of cases.

But you are still missing the point of why we're here today, which is how those regulations are going to address the problem that you are telling us about. That's the thing. We're examining those regulations, and the people who have looked at this in depth have said this will do very little.

In fact, a woman came to me and said it's going to do the opposite. She said it's going to tie up the police and tie up a lot of these resources that could be used much more effectively. She said it may even compound the situation within a home. If the police come and someone reports that So-and-so should have his guns confiscated, it may compound the situation because he will even feel more anger and resentment toward whomever. So there is a clear example of where it may do the exact opposite of what you're advocating.

Ms. Sandra Essex: I'm sorry, I don't share that opinion.

Ms. Gael MacLeod: I can't imagine that a woman would feel safer in a home with firearms where there's a domestic situation than without, and that's what you're saying. That just simply doesn't make sense.

Second, in their testimony the Alberta Council of Women's Shelters did have statistics—I'm afraid I don't have them with me—on the number of incidents involving firearms that did not get reported in terms of the police reports. I have a Calgary Herald article here that has to do with another situation with respect to the Stony reserve. It says the police do not record incidents where firearms are involved and there is no injury or death. There is no record of it.

So to say that a majority of situations do or don't have firearms involved—the only people who can give you that information are the people in the shelters, and they don't have the resources to be going through their entire files. Some of the shelters did that, but we don't have the exact numbers with us. We were unable to get that before today.

Ms. Sandra Essex: I would like to respond to that as well.

One of your points was about us not knowing how often guns are used in domestic violence. But we know how much they're used when there is a homicide, and we know that almost half are killed with guns. That is the weapon of choice when there's a homicide. You are absolutely correct, we don't have specific statistics on when the police are called if a weapon has been used.

You're also right that a woman will not say. Often she may not even know how many guns are in the house, and you can bet that if the police officer asks her if there is a gun in the house, she won't tell him because she's afraid the violence will escalate as soon as he's out the door. I don't disagree with you on that. But that's why it's so important for the police to know and be able to access a registration system. When they go in there they can say, you have registered guns here, we're answering a domestic dispute and we want those guns. That takes some of the pressure off her to report that there are guns in the home.

And if there is a registration process, that will give us more statistics. We know from our shelters that guns are used, and these are unregistered, legally owned rifles and shotguns. They are used a lot.

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The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you.

Mr. de Savoye, five minutes.

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Ms. Essex, Ms. MacLeod: this week the committee is examining the second batch of regulations that the Department of Justice is about to implement. This is why I expected your brief to contain some thoughts that related more specifically to the regulations this committee is currently examining. Instead, you have focussed on the merits of the Act. To a certain extent, your comments reinforce those we heard over a year ago. However, I must admit that this is not always a bad thing, since some may derive some benefits from this. I'm sure that Ms. Bakopanos will agree with me.

This being said, on several occasions you talked about the merits of firearms registration, because in a situation where there's domestic violence, this would enable a police officer to remove the firearm from the home.

I recall having asked a question when we were reviewing the legislation. I asked whether or not the police officers would be instructed to act in this fashion, namely, to remove the firearm. If the police officers continue to intervene by simply asking the people to try to get along and to be nice to each other, the registry will serve no purpose. However, I don't see any regulations or any other indications encouraging the police officers to be proactive, because what you're talking about, is being proactive.

Accordingly, Ms. Essex, Ms. MacLeod, I would like you to tell us what we need to do to get the police forces to be proactive.

[English]

Ms. Sandra Essex: To respond to your first comment, I thought I said at the beginning that we are here only to speak about the registration component of it. That's the piece that we believe—apart from the original legislation and the licensing—has a really important impact on domestic violence and domestic homicide. If you were looking for other information, I apologize that I didn't give it to you, but that's what we were asked to speak on and that's what we feel we're able to speak on—the registration component of it and how it's important to domestic violence and domestic homicide.

What was your next point?

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Actually, my point is this. We have specific pieces of regulations in front of us.

Ms. Sandra Essex: The education and training. Okay.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: You addressed the regulation as a whole, but that has kind of been settled by the legislation that is in force, and by the set of regulations that we had a year ago. My specific question to you is that the police force can intervene, but if they don't proactively use the registration file, we're getting nowhere.

Ms. Sandra Essex: I agree with you.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: What do you suggest be done? Should we have a specific set of regulations, which we don't have in front of us, that addresses that issue? What do you suggest?

Ms. Sandra Essex: This is another thing we hear in our shelters all the time. We hear from all women's groups that there is a problem out there. There is still an element in our society, a culture out there, that blames women for the domestic violence. She could have done something different. She dressed provocatively. They blame her for sexual assault and rape. There's a significant problem out there in changing society and how they see domestic violence.

There are certain elements in the police who are part of that problem as well. We know there are police officers who go to homes, blame the women and say, couldn't you have done something differently?

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I think you're absolutely right that part of the training needed is just another piece, but the registration tool has to be there and it needs to be built upon. There are experts here who can speak more about the training than I can, but I think the education of all our justice system—lawyers, police officers, everybody—is absolutely critical.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Will you go as far as to suggest that it be mandatory for a police officer to automatically seize a weapon if there's violence in that home? “No questions asked, just give me your weapon.”

Ms. Sandra Essex: If there's domestic—

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: The police officer is called to the premises. There's domestic violence. There's a gun in that home: “Give me the gun. No more questions. Give me the gun, and then we'll talk.”

Ms. Sandra Essex: I don't know that I can answer that question. In my opinion, if there's domestic violence, then with the cycle of violence, it tends to escalate with each additional incident. My fear would be that if the gun wasn't removed, she would end up dead at some point. I think the power has to be there to do that. But I can't answer your question, I'm sorry.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Thank you, ma'am, and thank you, Mr. Chair.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. MacKay, five minutes.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Ms. Essex, Ms. MacLeod, I want to commend you both on the tremendous work that you do through your organization. I think you've fairly outlined the significant impact that you have in the lives of women in this country.

As you know, the issue we are discussing relates to prevention if at all possible. I would like to follow up on my colleague's question. The ability of a police officer on a reported incident to go in and immediately remove firearms from the home—whether that is what should happen or not—is not going to be enacted by these registrations. Upon removing someone from a home, if that accused person is then taken before a justice of the peace or a provincial court judge, the ability does exist for a police officer to then have an order made. The Criminal Code permits for that. But in terms of early intervention, I think the point that was being made was that the police officer is not going to be given that discretion by virtue of this gun registration.

On the safety aspect that you spoke of, and how there is a cycle or escalation of violence, you would agree that impulsive acts are not going to be affected by this registration either. You mentioned previous legislation. This legislation is not about specific, tangible impediments to the use of a weapon. Bill C-17 envisioned trigger locks, keeping weapons separate from ammunition, keeping rifles in a safe environment by locking them. These are tangible things that you can see and that would, in a heated moment, cause a person to perhaps cool if he had to go through the process of loading a weapon and enabling it. That's not what this registration does either.

I'm still grasping to find out how you envisioned the actual registration itself acting in a proactive or preventive way to address this problem. I agree with you wholeheartedly that this is a problem in terms of the domestic violence in this country, so I'm not coming at it from that perspective. I just want to know how you envision registration being preventive per se?

Ms. Sandra Essex: Registration does not prevent domestic violence, and I need to reiterate that I said that in our brief. Domestic violence is rooted in an imbalance of power between men and women. It's rooted in the values of aggressiveness and dominance. Gun control will not eliminate domestic violence. This is a piece that will help.

The registration will tell police officers that there is a gun there. Because of the escalating nature of violence, it is especially important to remove that gun. As I also said in our brief, women will return thirty-odd times or more. They will keep coming back to the domestic violence. To have that gun there increases the extent of the injuries that she could get. She could be killed with the gun. It is really important to get that gun out of there, especially if she's not going to leave, if she's going to keep going back there. The registration is a tool for the police to remove that gun. That's how I see the registration aspect in terms of the police answering domestic dispute calls.

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We also believe that most people are law-abiding citizens. Most people are going to register their guns. I have five guns in my home, and those guns are going to be registered. Registering the guns and tying my name to those guns is going to make me a little more accountable for making sure they're locked up and not under my bed, for making sure that I've complied with the law. I believe most people will do that because most people are law-abiding citizens. Most men who abuse their spouses are law-abiding citizens—sorry, they're perceived as law-abiding citizens. They're not; they break the law all the time when they abuse women.

I believe the accountability will make women safer. For an impulsive act, if the gun is there and he has to take that gun out of its case and load it, she has a few extra minutes to get out of the house. Domestic violence is a very explosive, volatile situation. Most of the time, it's not premeditated. It's an impulsive act. If the gun is locked up, because he's accountable—his name is tied to that gun—that buys her some time to get out of the house.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Just so I can follow this, you're saying registering is going to increase compliance with previous legislation. Is it fair for me to say that?

Ms. Sandra Essex: I believe so, yes, absolutely.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. MacKay.

Ms. Gael MacLeod: I would like to add to that.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Okay, go ahead.

Ms. Gael MacLeod: I have another piece of research here: 190 out of 551 female victims of intimate partner killings, or 33%, were killed with firearms. Of the 551 killers in the study, 59% had criminal records, 13% had a psychiatric history that included hospitalization, and 55% were known by someone to have been violent toward the victim at some point prior to the killing. With registration, you have the ability to say these men don't qualify to own a firearm. Without registration, there is no ability to do that right now.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you. Is there anything from the government side? No?

You can have a quick, one-minute round, Mr. Thompson.

Mr. Myron Thompson (Wild Rose, Ref.): It is just a quick one, Mr. Chair.

On the issue of domestic violence, I've seen it in my own family, so I know what you're talking about. It's terrible. I think our effort in this country to punish those who are responsible for domestic violence is next to nothing. You just don't see the action that ought to be taken.

I travelled in the back seat of a police car one night, and we went to nine domestic disputes. On one occasion, we went to a place and there was a gun standing in the corner. It was immediately confiscated. In the other incidents, there were no guns, but knives were confiscated. One woman used a knife in defence.

In every case, the men were taken from the home and were asked if there was a relative nearby or some other place where they could spend the night. They were advised not to go back to the house. I see that solving nothing. The guys assaulted their wives. The evidence was there. The women didn't want to lay charges, because further repercussions would come if they did. They knew that.

I think all of those kinds of things really need to be addressed in whatever way it takes in order to say zero tolerance means that we are not going to stand for our women and children to have to suffer these kinds of consequences, that there are going to be some drastic measures taken against someone who decides to do otherwise. Now, that's going to mean incarceration of some sort. It's going mean a programming before that person is ever released into a situation in which he could go back to that same spouse and cause a problem. That's going to cost a lot of money.

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But I would venture to say something about those nine situations in which the person was removed from the home, though. If we created some avenue to address that person and his violence while we had a person engaged in looking after the crisis feature of the woman—you know, look after both aspects of it—and if we said loud and clear that the man would not be returned to the home until we knew with some degree of certainty that he was not going to do it again, I think it would be far more effective spending that kind of money on those kinds of programs. It would probably be just as effective as, or far more effective than, spending those kinds of dollars on registration. And believe you me, I want it to stop as much as you do.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Exactly. Good point.

Ms. Gael MacLeod: Thank you for those comments. I also share some of your experiences with personal experiences in domestic violence. I do come here as a volunteer for the YMCA, and have done so for some time, because of those experiences. I must say, though, that I don't see it as an either/or situation.

The YWCA in Calgary has initiated a number of preventive programs, including programs for the abusers. We're trying to take a much broader perspective with domestic abuse—that it's a family issue and that you need to deal with all elements and all members of the family. In fact, we have actually cut some beds in the shelter in order to be able to offer some of those programs, but that was not done without knowing the Calgary Women's Emergency Shelter had increased its beds. There wasn't a net loss of beds in the city.

In dealing with the preventive measures, which are so desperately needed to make sure this doesn't continue to be a systemic problem in the family, you can't have great recovery programs at the expense of not having shelters or not having beds in the shelters. If you do it that way, you have dead people, and that's not going to work very well either.

Mr. Myron Thompson: Perhaps I may clarify what I said. I wasn't talking about an either/or. That was the main thing.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): I'm afraid we're going to have to cut it off there, Mr. Thompson.

Ms. Gael MacLeod: I'll be quick.

Mr. Myron Thompson: You can get the guns now. The laws say, “Get 'em, get 'em.”

Ms. Gael MacLeod: Again, my experience goes back a number of years, as I suspect some of yours might, too. In my experience, it was my stepfather. There was a gun involved, and the police did respond. When I called and said there was a gun involved, they were there very quickly, but they didn't take the gun away.

Mr. Myron Thompson: They should have.

Mr. Gael MacLeod: Yes, but again, attitudes have changed.

Mr. Myron Thompson: But registrations wouldn't help. Take the gun.

Mr. Gael MacLeod: Well, there is a link now with—

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. Thompson....

Mr. Myron Thompson: Okay, I'll be quiet. He's ordering me to stop.

Ms. Sandra Essex: I have a question.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): You can have one final comment, Ms. Essex, because we have to move on. Our one minute is now four.

Ms. Sandra Essex: Can I ask a question?

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Very quickly, yes.

Ms. Sandra Essex: Mr. Thompson, you actually said that in those nine calls that you went to, there were no guns. How do you know?

Mr. Myron Thompson: No, I didn't say—

Ms. Sandra Essex: How do you know there—

Mr. Myron Thompson: Do you want this conversation to go on?

Ms. Sandra Essex: Without registration, how could you say there wasn't?

Mr. Myron Thompson: There was a gun and they immediately confiscated it—

Ms. Sandra Essex: Right, and then you said—

Mr. Myron Thompson: —and they immediately searched around the premises for any kind of a weapon. They were going to take those weapons, but the problem was that they took the men and did nothing with them.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Thompson.

Mr. de Savoye, you have one minute for both questions and answers.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I think Myron took my minute.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. MacKay.

Mr. Peter MacKay: I just want to make one point with respect to where we left off. I don't see the ability of the police to remove a weapon from the home being assisted by this. I see the ability for the police to know that guns are there, but if they're not going to remove them—as in the example that Mr. Thompson gave—or if they are going to remove the person from the home and simply release him to the care of his brother or someone down the street, that isn't going to address the problem either.

As for persons with psychiatric records or persons with records—and I assume you mean criminal records pertaining to the use of weapons—again, there are sanctions that can be put in place by a judge now to ban the person from having a firearm or a weapon for any number of years.

I guess what I'm getting at is that persons who have a psychiatric illness, persons who have a criminal record and know they are not supposed to be in possession of a firearm, are not people who are going to be affected by this legislation in any event.

Ms. Sandra Essex: But those aren't the only people who are abusing women, who own guns.

Mr. Peter MacKay: No, and you've made that point.

Ms. Sandra Essex: Right.

Mr. Peter MacKay: In the eyes of the community and the criminal justice system, they're not seen as criminals in many cases. Therefore, they are going to get weapons through this system. The registration process isn't going to deter them from obtaining a lawful, registered weapon and a licence.

• 1750

I'm suggesting they're not going to be concerned with compliance. If they have that weapon in their house and this impulsive situation arises, knowing the fact that it's registered is not going to deter them.

Ms. Sandra Essex: From using it? No, you're probably right, but when the police then answer that call, they know there's a weapon there, and that gives them the opportunity to take the weapon away. That's the point we're trying to make.

A woman is much more likely to die with a gun in a house than she is from a beating or even a knife. A gun isn't the only weapon used to kill women, but it's certainly the most lethal.

As I said, it's really important to get that gun out of the house as soon as possible. In order to do that, the police have to know about the gun. If it's registered, they'll know about it. They can't rely on the guy to say there's a gun there, and they certainly can't rely on the woman to say there's a gun there because she may not even know; or if she knows, she may not say. So that's how we see the registration being really important.

Mr. Peter MacKay: But the only way they're going to get—

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. MacKay, I think I'm going to have to cut you off, sir.

Mr. Peter MacKay: —a gun away from them is if they wind up in court.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Is there anyone from the government side here?

Ms. Sandra Essex: No, that's not my understanding.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you very much. We're running a lit bit behind, which is why I'm cutting people off.

Thank you very much. We appreciate your presence here.

We're going to just take a two-minute break.

• 1752

• 1755

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): We'll reconvene, please. We have Richard Feltoe from the British North America Living History Association with us.

Welcome back, Mr. Feltoe.

Mr. Richard Feltoe (Co-ordinator, British North America Living History Association): Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

Here I am again. Some of you have seen me before and have heard our arguments. I had great hopes that based on the last committee meeting we were at, with the subsequent recommendations from the committee, that would be it. It seemed to have gone extremely well. Unfortunately a few things have changed and I need to come back and talk to you once more.

For those of you who are new to the committee and haven't seen us before, I am part of an organization of volunteers who co-ordinate with historic sites in the presentation of elements of this nation's history, living history. Instead of just going in and seeing an exhibit or a historic building or something of that nature, you can actually see people living and explaining the life and times of our Canadian heritage.

In my particular case, the unit we represent is from the period of the War of 1812. I represent a Canadian militia force.

My colleague is here to assist me in talking about the weaponry problem we are dealing with, and in his particular case he participates in history of the American Civil War period. There was a sizeable Canadian component on both sides of that conflict.

What is the situation? The fact is that in February 1997 the legal affairs committee made a strong recommendation to the Minister of Justice regarding the exemption of reproduction antique firearms from the proposed regulations applicable under Bill C-68. I quote from the attachment in our brief:

The Subcommittee recommends that reproductions of antiques, such as flintlocks, matchlocks, and wheel-locks, be presented to be antique firearms, by prescribing such firearms as antiques under paragraph 84(1)b of the Criminal Code.

Effectively it meant that the reproductions would be classed in the same category as their original counterparts, which is what we had been looking for, and we were very grateful to receive that recommendation.

Subsequent to that, in April 1997 Minister of Justice Allan Rock accepted this recommendation without any amendment or restriction. I received a letter in May from the justice minister at the time, who said:

I recognize the vital role that your group plays in maintaining Canadians' understanding of their history and culture. One of the more important recommendations of the Report deals with reproduction firearms used in historical re-enactments. I am pleased to accept this recommendation.

He didn't say “accept parts” or “with provisos”, He said, “I am pleased to accept this recommendation.”

I did, however, have a small concern when I saw the recommendation, that it didn't actually quote the words “percussion cap”, which also came under the categories of anything that would be pre-1898 and not “centre-fire, rim-fire”, as the original Criminal Code had listed. I talked to members of the previous committee and got a distinct assurance that the terms in the phrase “such as flintlocks, matchlocks, and wheel-locks” were there as examples only, were not to preclude percussion cap, and that anything that was pre-1898 and fitted under the designations would be covered. Don't worry, they said. So I left it.

Then I saw the government document that came out from the bureaucrats. And while recommendation 36 stated:

The Subcommittee recommends that reproductions of antiques, such as flintlocks, matchlocks, and wheel-locks be presented to be antique firearms,

the way in which these bureaucrats listed it was:

The government accepts this recommendation. Reproductions of flintlocks, matchlocks, and wheel-locks will be prescribed to be antique firearms

So I called up the justice department and said, “There is a slight variance in a word here.” “Yes,” they said. “Well, percussion cap is included,” I said. “No,” they said. “Why not?” I said. “Because we've decided it's not included,” they said. And that's a quote.

• 1800

So what we are seeing here and what we're concerned about is that these individuals in the justice department took it upon themselves, without any consultation with us as interested parties or with the justice committee, to redefine which historical reproductions will or will not be included under the exemption. They have specifically deleted percussion cap pieces from the exemption.

As a result, this deletion represents a threat to the continued viability of mid-19th century living history re-enactments. This will affect thousands of Canadian and American citizens in the pursuit of their legitimate hobby. In addition, the deletion will inevitably result in the cancellation of a number of living history events in Canada, thus affecting the revenues and attendance at historic sites and museums that host these venues for the public.

I would also like to put a little scenario before you. The pieces we brought in are in fact an original flintlock, which is covered, and a reproduction flintlock, which will be covered once the exemption goes through. We also have the slightly updated version of the percussion cap, which was used in the American Civil War and at other contemporaneous periods in Canadian history.

None can fire any faster than the others; they are all basically the same. But this one now will not be included. Each one of them has a barrel width in excess of half an inch. This fires a lead ball—that's if we could get them, but we can't because that ammunition is not available in Canada—that's about the size of the end of your thumb. Unfortunately, under the regulations, anything over .50 calibre, half an inch, is classed as an anti-tank weapon.

Therefore, if these pieces here, the percussion caps, are maintained as being deleted, think about what it will be like at a Canadian border crossing when a customs guard starts checking on the car coming in. The guy tells him he's got a firearm for historic re-enactment. He starts putting it into the computer, then all the bells go off. Why? Because—guess what?—he's bringing an anti-tank weapon into Canada.

This isn't just one person, this will be hundreds. That's what it's going to look like, because that's the way the rules are written and that's the way it reads. This, believe it or not, is an anti-tank weapon. That's the way they see it.

I was asked by one individual why the members of the justice department raised this change. The answer I got back from them was that it was because people use them for hunting.

What they failed to understand and report when they made up their altered version was that there are various kinds of percussion caps. The ones mainly used for hunting are not the historically accurate ones that would be used in historical re-enactments, and vice versa. Nobody would get away with walking into an historical re-enactment with the kind of percussion cap weapon that is generally used for hunting. They would be thrown off the field immediately. These things, being military-type issue, are not the kind the hunter would want to use in his hunting technique. Quite frankly, they are not designed for that kind of use.

So why can't we split them up? According to justice department officials, a percussion cap is a percussion cap is a percussion cap. If it's one, it's all. We're a bit concerned about this.

So what are we asking for? Are we asking for a new categorization and another rewrite? No. Are we asking for an extension? No. We are simply asking that this committee report back to the justice minister with a recommendation to endorse the original recommendation of the previous committee. The exemption should be set as originally stipulated. Press the justice minister to implement the exemption through an order in council at the earliest possible opportunity.

Ladies and gentlemen, there are dozens of events across this country that are hanging on the decision of this committee. Whether the events will take place or not, whether those museums will have those events next year, depends entirely on getting this exempt through the order in council process—now. It is now that we are working on the programs. We need it. Please.

• 1805

Understanding all of that, we still come back to the fact that these percussion caps seem to be a thorny issue. Ideally, if the exemption went through exactly as it was originally written, it would be great, but we are not trying to be bloody-minded. We are quite prepared to work at trying to help the justice department get what it feels it needs.

How can we do that? By saying that while the flint-wheel and matchlock variety can be going as a group designation, we are quite prepared to see the percussion cap set split into two different types and the individual weapons in the percussion cap group needed for the military historical re-enactment element be designated individually, just like modern orders in council take place.

The question then remains, how many pieces do we need? The answer is two. Two percussion-cap, muzzle-loading rifled muskets are all we need to cover 99% of the historical re-enactors. Those are the Enfield and the Springfield. Their exact designations can be supplied at a moment's notice to the justice department for their purposes.

We do not need every single percussion cap covered, if that's the problem. Give us two, and we're happy little campers.

Mr. Andrew Phillips (Ottawa Valley American Civil War Society): Happy little re-enactors.

Mr. Richard Feltoe: We camp as well.

I thank you for your attention. I know this is something that's not in the normal run of your purview on this issue, but it affects us, unfortunately, and it affects all the museums and heritage sites that try to put on displays and promote our heritage.

I am quite prepared to take any questions you may have, ladies and gentlemen.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. Breitkreuz, five minutes, please.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Thank you very much.

I really enjoyed your presentation. You've made your points very well. I take issue with you when you say the committee has the power to carry this out. We don't. I would like to simply recommend that those in power take to heart what you have just said.

I have no questions.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Breitkreuz. Mr. de Savoye.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Mr. Chair, if this is an antique weapon, well, I didn't think our military hardware was that antiquated.

Voices: Oh, oh!

[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Mr. Feltoe, it's always a pleasure to see you here, because you put so much vigour into your presentations and you illustrate them so well so that we can get the picture better.

I'd like to go back to recommendation 36 proposed by the Standing Committee on Justice during the previous parliamentary session. You are quite right: we provided examples and the list was not exhaustive. I am surprised that the Department of Justice has not followed up on the matter.

Mr. Chairman, is there anyone here from the Department of Justice who could provide us with some clarification?

[English]

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Bill, do you feel you can address this situation—if it's okay with the committee?

Go ahead.

Mr. William C. Bartlett (Legal Counsel, Canadian Firearms Centre, Department of Justice): I don't know if I can give you a complete answer. Our advice on these matters comes from the chief scientist for firearms for the RCMP. He has advised us that when it come to percussion cap technology, it is simply too difficult to tell one from the other. It would be very easy for the people who produce them for hunting to produce them to look, I understand, like both of the models Mr. Feltoe has referred to, the Enfield and the other. The difficulty may very well be how any customs officer or anyone else in the field would be able to tell the difference.

• 1810

Our advice is that the percussion cap technology is a continuum and that it simply doesn't subdivide into obvious and clear categories. They may be obvious and clear to Mr. Feltoe, but for those who would have to administer and enforce this, it could be a very difficult task.

I might just note that the Firearms Act doesn't define things over .50 calibre as anti-tank weapons. Mr. Feltoe may be referring to the Export and Import Permits Act. The controlled lists under that act may well define firearms of more than .50 calibre as being anti-tank weapons, but the Firearms Act does not.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: But you do understand my point. We have a situation here that will cause damage to what I would call a specific industry. This is an industry, an industry that is not really a danger to society.

I'm asking you what the solution is. We must find the solution...the RCMP thing is very interesting. What I'm looking for is a solution. Is a solution at hand or will we have to pass more legislation to find one? What is the easiest way from here to there?

Mr. William Bartlett: In terms of a workable solution, the best I can undertake to do is to go back and talk to our experts at the RCMP. This isn't simply an RCMP concern. They are providing us with the advice upon which we must act and it's on the basis of that advice that the line has been drawn. There always was a question of drawing a line at some point where it was feasible to identify and single—

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I have much respect for the RCMP, but we have expert witnesses here who apparently know far more than the RCMP, and maybe the Department of Justice could rely a little more on their expertise than on RCMP expertise, where it is so warranted, in order to get the expertise from the right place.

Maybe Mr. Feltoe would like to add to this.

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Sir, with all due respect, the fact of the matter is that any modern weapon deemed to be prohibited by an order in council is very clearly identified and designated by pictures, specifications, measurements and so on, so that any officer trying to say something is definitely a prohibited weapon can easily identify it without any previous expertise in his own right.

If you take that and rotate it in the other direction, surely the same kind of documentation can be used to identify the specific items that may be exempted and anything that doesn't match these criteria, this picture, etc., does not get exempted. One can simply say that it is not the same kind of weapon and it is not the same element and therefore it is not exempted.

Any weapon that is historically reproduced to represent a weapon of this technology automatically and inherently accepts all of the limitations of loading and firing and the ammunition that goes with the original. If if doesn't match up to the specifications of the original, it is not a reproduction by the definition of what a reproduction is. That is my answer to that.

And we are quite happy to provide technical details, drawings and gun manufacturers' specifications right down to the nth degree so that we can ensure that no government official is trying to do this job without the proper information and to ensure that only those pieces that should be exempted are exempted.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Feltoe.

Mr. MacKay.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Just to follow up on that, the point has been made very well by my colleague from the Bloc. Certainly the RCMP are not the only ones with expertise in this area.

I've heard two conflicting versions of the distinction that can be made with respect to percussion cap instruments, and perhaps, Mr. Feltoe, you could tell us how that designation could be made between the type of weaponry that you would use in your re-enactments and that which a hunter might use. In any event, I understand that it would be a very rare occurrence for a percussion cap instrument to be used for hunting.

• 1815

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Not quite. When you talk about the words “percussion cap”, you're talking about a hammer impacting upon a nipple and exploding a small cartridge placed on it. In the main, hunters make use of ones whereby the impact takes place in a direct line through the barrel. The kind of pieces we're talking about have everything external. So the cap is on the outside and the hammer is to the side.

Basically all that happened when these were first developed was that they took the old flintlock, hacksawed off this bit, welded on a nozzle, and said that was the new version. The rest of it stayed the same.

Mr. Peter MacKay: So the hammer's not in line with the barrel?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: That's right. The mechanisms are just as primitive as those on the original flintlocks.

We can specify, as I said, two weapons. That's all it takes for 99% of the re-enactors to come under that category.

Anybody else who is trying to use any other kind of percussion cap will automatically have to register simply because they don't match the specifications of these two weapons.

Mr. Peter MacKay: You've explained that very eloquently in thirty seconds. You also told us that pictures could be provided with respect to prohibited and restricted weapons.

My question is the same as yours: what's the problem here? Further to that, why weren't you able to get satisfaction from the Department of Justice? You referred to the previous minister. What contact have you had with the department since the change in government?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: At the point we started to understand this concern, we were preparing to talk among ourselves as to what we could do. Then, quite bluntly, last Thursday some little angel was working, because I got a phone call inviting me to appear before the committee. I said fine. I was not going to miss the opportunity to try to raise this question on a more elevated plane.

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen: You think this is elevated, do you?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Considering the level of response, I consider this a very elevated body. I can assure you that I appreciate any assistance you can give us.

Mr. Derek Lee: Could you give us an idea of some examples of historic re-enactments that might be impaired as a result of the current draft of the regulations in relation to the percussion cap of Enfields and Springfields?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Certainly. I'll ask my colleague Mr. Phillips to give you one example, a local one.

Mr. Andrew Phillips: A couple of years ago we started doing a small living history event here. One year we did it down at the Swords and Ploughshares Museum, which is a privately run museum. We do that every year with them to help with their open house and raise funds to keep it going.

This past year, we did a thing out at the Log Farm, which actually got very extensive coverage on CJOH and CHRO.

We actually just had our year-end dinner at Old Fort Henry. You can rent a fort in Canada, which I think is great. That fort is there, so let's use it, for heaven's sakes.

We had people come from Ohio. We have commitments from people from as far away as Boston, Massachusetts, to attend our event next year because we go down and do theirs. They've never been up here.

One family, the Nathans, live in Boston proper. They are definitely coming next year. When they come up, he books two weeks off work. They spend two weeks in eastern Ontario. They eat meals, stay in hotels, travel, and hit the tourist sites. They spend their money. They come up here because they really like coming up here.

All the money that's generated at the gate goes toward the Log Farm. We don't take any pay for what we do, but we would do it anyway.

We have an excellent site. These are all period buildings. The re-enactors love it. They're dying to come back. The Log Farm gets all the money. On top of that, we try to get donations for the food banks. So we look at it as win-win-win.

Mr. Richard Feltoe: But if this goes through, what are those Americans going to say?

Mr. Andrew Phillips: They would say that they would love to come, but not if they have to pay $60 for a permit for two days. Thomas brings up his three boys with him. There are four muskets. That's $240 to come up for three days just to get across the border. They all use the 1853 Enfield or 1861 Springfield, which are extremely distinctive and easily identified.

• 1820

Mr. Derek Lee: If I may, I'm definitely not a purist in military re-enactments, historic ones. Can I assume that there are a fairly large number of these percussion cap firearms in Canada, but that there are an even greater number in the northern U.S. states used for that purpose? Is that correct?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Yes, that's correct.

Mr. Derek Lee: Can you just clarify something for me? This is probably going to sound like a stupid question, but why doesn't military re-enactment just move to the older flintlock or matchlock or something?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: The reason is that we are trying as far as possible to reproduce the historical accuracy of the specific time period. If I, for example, wanted to do the early settlers in Acadia, I would be using a wheel-lock or a matchlock. I would never use a flintlock simply because they didn't exist at that time.

In the same way, while some flintlocks were used at the very beginning of the Civil War period, for example, by the end of it they were pretty well gone.

No individual in an 1812 event is allowed to make use of percussion cap technology, simply because it's not appropriate to the time period.

If you're going to do a living history re-enactment, you've got to use the stuff that was there at the time. This was the time of the Civil War. It was the 1860s. In Canada there were Canadian militia units formed up, such as the Chedabucto Grays and so on. This is what they were provided with. This is what they should be wearing and using in their displays.

Mr. Derek Lee: Last, do you have a technical description now that you could leave with us?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: I could provide that within about 24 to 48 hours.

Mr. Derek Lee: It just might be helpful for the clerk to have something on hand in case members of the committee wanted to make specific reference to something later. This is without nailing the thing down completely.

Mr. Richard Feltoe: What I do have is Parks Canada's own manual on the differences between flints and percussion cap. I don't have that with me, unfortunately, but I can fax them up.

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen: We can get that directly.

Mr. Derek Lee: If government has it, we should be able to get it.

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Parks Canada has a whole manual out on the care of pieces.

Mr. Derek Lee: Thank you.

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen: I just have this, otherwise my neighbour, Susan Whelan, won't forgive me.

Fort Malden is in Essex county, which is right near Windsor. They do re-enactments all the time in Amherstburg. Can you tell me whether this will affect them? Are they using this kind of weapon?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: They have percussion weapons down at Fort Malden. We are also talking about many of the sites in central Canada.

You have to remember that while I take part in re-enactments in the Ontario of 1812, that section of Canada really wasn't settled properly. It wasn't until that later period, when these weapons were in vogue, that this part of the country was settled.

Any museum that's west of Ontario will automatically be slammed because of this omission. You can get away with it at some of the sites in Ontario, Quebec, and the maritimes, but as for the western provinces, they're dead meat.

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen: Are these new guns that are made to look like old ones?

Mr. Richard Feltoe: Yes, they are. They're all reproductions.

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen: Thanks.

The Vice-Chairman (John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. Feltoe and your colleague. We appreciate your comments and found them very interesting. Thank you.

We'll adjourn for two minutes, then we'll have the final group come along now.

• 1824

• 1827

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Our final witnesses tonight are from Savage Arms (Canada) Inc. We have Ernie Barriage and Barrie King with us.

Good evening, gentlemen. Thank you for coming. Sorry to keep you waiting. Would you go ahead and proceed, please.

Mr. Barrie King (Vice-President and General Manager, Savage Arms (Canada) Inc.): Thank you, members, for this opportunity to appear before you. We are located in Lakefield, Ontario. With me today is Ernie Barriage, our national sales manager.

I'm not sure how effective we can be as we have had to deal with a time factor here that would not allow us sufficient time to submit a thorough, in-depth contribution to this committee. However, we are here and we will do our very best and move forward.

I wish to add that my background prior to March 3, 1997, was not dealing with firearms. I was not even a holder of an FAC at that time. My predecessor, Al Taylor, was in step with this legislation and prior legislation. I suppose I should call this proposed legislation. Al retired at the end of March 1997.

We are the only manufacturer in Canada of .22 calibre long rifles. We manufacture this calibre and only this calibre for the sporting market around the world.

Our parent company is Savage Sports Corporation, 100 Springdale Road in Westfield, Massachusetts, U.S.A. Like us, they manufactures long rifles. Savage U.S.A. manufactures centre-fire products, products of higher calibre, where we manufacture sporting rim-fire only.

Here are our concerns. We are a manufacturer and as such we have an in-house activity that allows us to be competitive, to sell our product around the world against much larger companies, and to be profitable. However, this legislation may take away the manufacturing advantages that may be used by our competition. We don't know—for example, permits, registration, and reporting of daily production, shipments, and/or work in process. What level of the new licensing should our employees require? Currently, they require a firearms acquisition certificate; under the new legislation there are licensing levels one through five. We feel the industry should be required to be at a level two, which gives a security background check.

• 1830

The second concern is export permits and licences. We do not know where this is going. We presently export 97% of our production. Any legislation costs to export are additional costs to our manufacturing and distribution costs and consequently reduce our opportunity to make a profit and become competitive in the export markets. After this legislation goes into effect, it is our believe our exports will represent 99% of our business. What we will need to do on a daily, weekly, monthly, etc., basis to conform to the legislation? We don't know.

Our third concern is transportation licence fees. We do not know who or if any carrier will be interested in this commodity because of the proposed legislation. In fact, this legislation restricts certain companies so if they did apply they would not receive approval.

In summary, we employ 65 people in a location where there are only two industries and we are one of the two. We are expanding as I speak. This is the result of our ability in the past twelve months to be competitive in the export market. Savage Canada wants to be a responsible manufacturer and wants to be co-operative, but it also wants to continue to manufacture in Canada.

We have no real sense or direction as to how this legislation will impact on the three concerns we have brought to your attention here today, except we strongly believe the impact will be negative to a manufacturer. Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. King.

Mr. Breitkreuz, five minutes, please.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: What contact have you had with the justice department and how has it addressed your concerns? What answers has it given you?

Mr. Barrie King: Since March 1997 I have not contacted anyone in the justice department. Ernie was with Al Taylor, who has made presentations. Ernie, can you elaborate?

Mr. Ernie Barriage (National Sales Manager, Savage Arms (Canada) Inc.): We've had no recent contact with the department. When Al was still working at our facility, he and I approached department officials a few times and asked them what the fees were going to be. At that point they said they did not know. This is where we are now, because we still don't know.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Savage Arms raised this issue previously at the committee meetings. That's why I asked that question. I think somebody around here should actually answer that question. Maybe we can again ask someone to come here and talk about this.

You mentioned that 97% of your production is exported. You then said 99% will be exported. How do you arrive at those numbers?

Mr. Barrie King: It's the effect of needing an FAC. In the Canadian marketplace—Ernie will check me on my numbers—in 1993-94 Canadian Tire, for instance, would have bought anywhere from 12,000 to 15,000 units. Our company at that time may have produced 25,000 units. This past year—our fiscal year ends October 31—Canadian Tire purchased about 1,300 units.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: That's less than one-tenth.

Mr. Barrie King: Yes. Whatever takes place here with this legislation, I think it's fair to say Canadian Tire will stop handling our product. Home Hardware, which wasn't in the same league as Canadian Tire, has had the same kind of drop. If it gave us 4,000 to 5,000 units previously, it's now down now to 300 or 400.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: That's one reason why we're saying our exports will increase, because our Canadian sales will gradually decrease.

Mr. Barrie King: There won't be much of a market, if any. There won't be one to sustain a manufacturer, that's for sure.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: We've repeatedly asked questions and never had an answer on the economic impact of this legislation on the Canadian economy. We have never received a reply. It's not just going to be in arms sales, of course. Maybe somebody from the justice department can enlighten us.

• 1835

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): All right, Bill, if you wish, but be brief. You're here for information purposes only, you're not on trial.

Mr. William Bartlett: I must say I'm a little mystified that there's a concern about what the applicable fees will be, because all of the fees were in the regulations that were tabled last November. The fees for carriers, for authorizations to import and export, haven't changed from what was tabled last November.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: What are the fees?

Mr. William Bartlett: For an interprovincial carrier it's $200, rising to $250 in the second year; for an international carrier it's $300, rising to $375. I understand we have had a number of carriers indicate that they are interested in becoming licensed carriers. I don't have an exact number, but certainly there are carriers who are interested. The fee for the authorization to import and export is $20.

Mr. Barrie King: Per entry?

Mr. William Bartlett: For each authorization it's $20, and then there's a bulk rate of $5,000 for those who require a large number of authorizations in any one year. In other words, you pay for 250 of these and then the fee is waived thereafter.

Mr. Barrie King: Can I ask why there is any fee whatsoever?

Ms. Shaughnessy Cohen: On a point of order, I'll try not to back-seat drive here, and I appreciate Bill's input, but this is leaving the realm of what we're here to do, which is to look at the present regulations and the regulations that are here today. I'm sure because Bill has been living with us for the last little while, and I think intends to for the next little while, that he could maybe take some time aside with these gentlemen to enlighten them on what the old regulations were, but if there are specific comments about the new regulations, it's been a very long day and maybe we should get to it.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Ms. Cohen.

[Translation]

Mr. de Savoye.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I had the pleasure of sitting on the regulations committee about a year ago and I remember that the Savage company, along with other businesses, had appeared before the committee and had talked about some of the difficulties it was experiencing as a result of the legislation and its regulations.

I also recall that we had recommended that discussions be held with industry spokespersons, not necessarily with Savage or another company, but with industry spokespersons. I am somewhat saddened to see that to date irritants still exist which could preclude a legitimate business, one that abides by very appropriate safety standards, from viewing its business future with a bit more hope. This was not the objective sought by the Act and its regulations. Something is still not right here. I would say to the people from Savage, as I said that last time to the people from the industry in general, that the committee will no doubt make the appropriate recommendations.

What does concern me, after listening to our historical reenactment friends, is whether or not the recommendations that we make, even if we're told that they are being followed, are really having the impact we had in mind. I feel like doing what I did with Mr. Feltoe earlier, namely, I gave him my business card so that he could keep me up to date on what is going on. I, in turn, will keep you up to date as well. We do good work here, we work honestly and enthusiastically, however, if there is some oversight at the departmental level, there is no feedback loop that enables us to get things back on track.

I would like to thank the people from Savage for informing us about this matter. We will keep in contact this time. Tell us whether or not you are satisfied.

[English]

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Do you wish to respond? I think it was just a comment.

Mr. Barrie King: We don't wish to to respond.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Mr. MacKay.

• 1840

Mr. Peter MacKay: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you on behalf of the committee as well for being here. We appreciate this kind of input tremendously.

It seems to me that perhaps one of your underlying concerns in all three instances is that the market itself in Canada, whether it be subsidiaries you're selling to or the public at large who would be buying your product, is going to be negatively impacted by the implementation of the regulations. I'm wondering if you have had contact with any of your competitors as to their perception or their take on what's going to happen as a result.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: Are you talking about the Canadian market itself?

Mr. Peter MacKay: Yes, I'm talking strictly about the Canadian market.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: No, it's felt that this market will decrease as well with registration and things like this.

Mr. Peter MacKay: How many small arms manufacturers are there in Canada?

Mr. Ernie Barriage: Just ourselves.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Okay, so there is no one else.

Mr. Barrie King: And sporting rifles.

I think that's a point I want to make. We're the only manufacturer. I didn't get a sense from Mr. Taylor, and I don't get a sense that.... We're just part of legislation. I think whatever has taken place so far has been effective. You can tell how many .22 calibre rifles are sold in Canada. It's next to nothing. It wouldn't sustain employees, who were once 50 and now are up to 65, and we're going to expand on that. All of our business.... The figures are 99%; 97% is for sure, and 99% is what we believe. It's not going to land in Canada. It's going to go to the United States.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Your guns are either going back to the U.S. or a European market, too, I suspect for export market.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: Yes, all over the world. It's gone from 12,000 to 15,000 down to 1,200 or 1,500 in less than two years. That should tell you what this legislation is doing, and that's fine, but we're in Lakefield to build product for the world market and we would like to be able to stay competitive to do that.

We feel that if the competition doesn't have any of the impediments that we will have to have because we manufacture...which seems to be a unique activity with the rest of the individuals in Canada who are concerned with the Firearms Act. We don't want to be forgotten, because to have a plant that can't respond, cannot be competitive....

I think there's a lot of impact when you have someone hurt or killed because of a rifle. I think that's very personal, but it's also very personal if you have to tell 65 people they don't have a job, that they don't have an income. You are talking low-skilled individuals. It's tough to get a job when you have skills. I just went through it. So when they have no skills it's going to impact on people too. They won't be seen by the legislation, but they're going to be there, and it's going to go beyond 65 because most of these people have spouses and children and so on.

So I'm just battling to continue to help the economy by producing product that doesn't end up in Canada, for the major part of it.

Mr. Peter MacKay: I think your point is very well made. I think it ties in with the commentary by my colleague in the Reform with respect to the full economic impact of the regulations in the legislation itself. I thank you.

Mr. Barrie King. Okay. Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. MacKay. Mr. Lee.

Mr. Derek Lee: Thank you.

One is unsure if you were addressing any subject matter that is before us here today. There is a segment of the current regulations we're reviewing that deals with the transport by business of firearms. Neither of you have addressed the actual economics of the current regulatory burden and its impact on your business. I happen to be very interested in that and I'm sure members around the table would be. I get the impression from hearing your earlier evidence here that you haven't noted or measured the impact of the current regulatory burden, either for FACs or transport or export permits, or the increased costs imposed on the carriers who move your product to the border and out of the country. Do you have any information in that line that could enlighten us as to this economic impact?

• 1845

Mr. Ernie Barriage: In terms of the freight factor, at this point we don't know. We know what we pay now for freight if we have to go through the licensing system. We have no idea what the carriers' freight rates are going to increase by. Since we pay the freight—

Mr. Derek Lee: But these regulations are already in place, if I'm not mistaken. Isn't that right, Mr. Chairman?

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Not these.

Mr. Derek Lee: No, the regulations under Bill C-60, under the Firearms Act. The first set of regulations, which set fees in the first regulatory regime, is not in place now. When does that...?

Well, then, that's why you don't know; you haven't had to pay anything yet.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: That's right.

Mr. Derek Lee: All right. That's something we can only keep our eye on. I'm also surprised you haven't done a dry run for us to indicate—

Mr. Ernie Barriage: Because the freight carriers cannot give us a rate of what they're going to charge. We're at their mercy at this point.

Mr. Derek Lee: It's going to cost them $250 to register themselves, plus the aggravation factor of applying and getting the appropriate licence designation. But in terms of the cost of exporting, every time you send a shipment to the border there's going to be a need to register the firearm and then get a permit to export.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: We would have to do this?

Mr. Derek Lee: Yes. You have a double whammy. I understand it's being done by an electronic system, but you're going to have to buy into the electronic system and provide the communications and the numbers—

Mr. Ernie Barriage: Which we currently don't have.

Mr. Derek Lee: Yes. I regret that we can't go through it more today.

In my particular riding, colleagues, is another firearms manufacturer. They have an operation involving about 75 employees in my riding and a related operation in Montreal, where a number of other employees are employed.

So, yes, I'm interested, but I guess we can't cover too much more ground on that at this juncture.

Thank you.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Are there any further questions from anyone?

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I'd like a clarification on this last point.

My understanding was that you were the only firearms manufacturer; are you the only ones of .22 rim-fire long rifles?

Mr. Barrie King: To our knowledge.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: To your knowledge. But there are other firearms manufacturers in Canada of other firearms.

Mr. Barrie King: Yes.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: There's a military operation in Kitchener that makes military guns, Diemaco, I believe.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Do you have an association? Do you have any idea how many of these manufacturers will be impacted by this legislation in the same way you are? Have you any idea?

Mr. Ernie Barriage: I assume they all would be, if they're Canadian.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: So how big is this association? How many manufacturers would there be altogether?

Mr. Barrie King: I don't think there is an association of manufacturers of firearms.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: We're just talking firearms.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Is there some kind of informal network? You must know who your competitors are, or who else is out there manufacturing 30-30s or whatever.

Mr. Ernie Barriage: The bulk of our competitors, if you're talking about in Canadian business, are U.S. manufacturers.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: But you don't know how many manufacturers are in Canada.

Mr. Barrie King: For our product, there's none.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I mean of all firearms that would be impacted. You don't know.

Mr. Barrie King: No.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Okay. Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Eleni.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: I know it's not appropriate, Mr. Chairman, but I would like to address my question, actually, to members of the firearms...Bill, in other words.

How many of the manufacturers did the Department of Justice consult? I'm new to this file, so bear that in mind. I wasn't here when the previous consultations were done.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: It's a “point of order” question.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: It is a point of order, yes.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: Not fair.

Mr. William Bartlett: Certainly Savage Arms has been consulted several times, as has Para-Ordnance, and SNC-Lavalin, which does some very specialized work for the military. Diemaco has also been consulted.

The three major manufacturers in Canada are Savage, Para-Ordnance and Diemaco in the military field, and SNC was also consulted.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: So they were consulted on these regulations.

Mr. William Bartlett: Yes.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos: Thank you.

• 1850

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): I appreciate your comments and the questions directed to Bill. I think in order to not break up the discussions and get off on a tangent, we can make a record of what you want to ask and have the department come back and respond to these questions. I think that's the proper way of dealing with it, which is what we've done this evening. Is that okay with the other members?

[Translation]

Pierre.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: Mr. Chairman, I noticed that Mr. MacKay had a document that our witnesses from Savage had given him. It appears to be their brief and I would like, for the benefit of all committee members, that this document be made available as soon as possible in both official languages.

[English]

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Thank you, Mr. de Savoye. I wasn't aware that a document was circulated.

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz: I didn't get it.

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: He had a speech. I asked Peter where he got it and he told me. I thought it would be fine for every one of us.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Peter, if you would share your information with us, we'll have it translated.

Mr. Peter MacKay: It's the same as his presentation; it's a letter to the committee. I assumed that it was available.

The Vice-Chairman (Mr. John Maloney): Okay. We will get a copy in both official languages and have it circulated. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We appreciate your coming this evening.

We are adjourned until 9.30 a.m. tomorrow.