Questions and responses 42nd Parliament, 1st session December 3, 2015, to September 11, 2019

With regard to expenditures by the government on subscriptions and data access services by the government in the 2017-18 fiscal year, broken down by department, agency, Crown corporation or other government entity: (a) what is the total amount spent; and (b) what are the details of each expenditure, including (i) vendor, (ii) amount, (iii) date, (iv) description of goods or services, (v) titles of publications or data for each subscription, (vi) file number?

With regard to the Firearms Reference Table (FRT): (a) what information is contained in the FRT; (b) how many entries are there in the FRT; (c) what is the threshold for changing information in the FRT, including (i) the information required to necessitate a change, (ii) the process for drafting changes, (iii) the stakeholder engagement process, (iv) the approval process, (v) the approval authority; (d) who has access to the FRT, including (i) federal government entities, (ii) provincial government entities, (iii) foreign government entities, (iv) Canadian businesses, (v) foreign businesses, (vi) Canadian institutions, (vii) foreign institutions, (viii) Canadian individuals, (ix) foreign individuals; (e) does the government consider the FRT a quasi-statutory instrument due to the potential impact on the property rights of Canadians; (f) if the answer to (e) is affirmative, what is the legislative basis for the FRT; (g) if the answer to (e) is affirmative, were there any outside legal opinions sought regarding the FRT as a quasi-statutory instrument due to the potential impact on the property rights of Canadians; (h) has the government conducted an analysis as to the application of the Statutory Instruments Act to the FRT; and (i) if the answer to (h) is affirmative, what was the conclusion of the assessment?

With regard to the continuous-eligibility screening of firearms licence holders and the Firearms Interest Police (FIP) database, for the year 2017: (a) how many FIP events were matched to a person with a firearms license; (b) how many FIP events were matched to a person without a firearms license; (c) what was the average time it took to initiate an investigation of a FIP event; (d) what was the average time it took to complete the investigation of a FIP event; (e) how many FIP events that resulted in firearms being removed from possession of the licensed gun owner; (f) how many FIP events that resulted in firearms being removed from possession of a person without a firearms license; (g) what was the average time it took from reporting of the FIP event to the firearms being removed from the possession of the licensed gun owner; and (h) what was the average time it took from reporting of the FIP event to the firearms being removed from the possession of the person without a firearms license?

With regard to reports by the Privacy Commissioner of Canada and the Auditor General of Canada, and their recommendations to correct deficiencies in the Firearms Interest Police (FIP) database: (a) what is the status of the implementation of the recommendations of the Privacy Commissioner and Auditor General; (b) how are persons notified that they have been flagged in the FIP database; (c) how can persons flagged in the FIP Database access their records; (d) how can persons flagged in the FIP Database appeal to correct their records; and (e) what evidence is there that the FIP database has been an effective gun control measure?

With regard to Transport Canada’s use of a database called GradeX to predict potential accident hot spots at railway crossings: (a) how long has Transport Canada maintained this database; (b) who is consulted in preparing and updating the lists on this database; (c) what metrics are used by Transport Canada to assess potential accident hot spots; (d) how does Transport Canada measure whether a crossing poses a high risk for collisions; (e) what are the 500 highest risk railway crossings as of May 10, 2016; (f) for each of the crossings listed in (e), and since the government began collecting this data in the database, how many (i) accidents have occured, (ii) fatalities have occurred; (g) how many public complaints have been received about each of the crossings listed in (e) since the government began collecting this data in the database; and (h) does the government have any plans to make this database available to the public and municipalities, and, if so, when and how does it intend to do so?