At the beginning of his speech, the hon. member said no new taxes were to be expected. I was not talking about taxes. I was talking about permits, the purchase of permits and the fact that we always seem to be in favour of user fees. Currently, we simply allow people to buy guns. Right now, all you have to do is get a $50 firearm certificate valid for five years and you can buy an unlimited number of firearms. It is a little much to ask of those who eventually have to pay for the people who want to buy firearms.
All those permits, the permits to carry a gun or to own a gun, all of those firearm permits are free, except for the restricted firearm certificate. All the others are free.
Why could firearm owners not pay for those permits, and I mean pay a fair price for them, not just a token amount of $50 for five years? That is totally ridiculous.
The hon. member voiced another reservation concerning the fact that more people die of injuries caused by knives or cutting and stabbing weapons that by guns and firearms. I would like to see the statistics on that, because that is not what we heard in committee.