Bill C-71 (Historical)

An Act to amend certain Acts and Regulations in relation to firearms

Part 1 of this Act amends the Firearms Act to, among other things,
(a) remove the reference to the five-year period, set out in subsection 5(2) of that Act, that applies to the mandatory consideration of certain eligibility criteria for holding a licence;
(b) require, when a non-restricted firearm is transferred, that the transferee’s firearms licence be verified by the Registrar of Firearms and that businesses keep certain information related to the transfer; and
(c) remove certain automatic authorizations to transport prohibited and restricted firearms.
Part 1 also amends the Criminal Code to repeal the authority of the Governor in Council to prescribe by regulation that a prohibited or restricted firearm be a non-restricted firearm or that a prohibited firearm be a restricted firearm and, in consequence, the Part
(a) repeals certain provisions of regulations made under the Criminal Code; and
(b) amends the Firearms Act to grandfather certain individuals and firearms, including firearms previously prescribed as restricted or non-restricted firearms in those provisions.
Furthermore, Part 1 amends section 115 of the Criminal Code to clarify that firearms and other things seized and detained by, or surrendered to, a peace officer at the time a prohibition order referred to in that section is made are forfeited to the Crown.
Part 2, among other things,
(a) amends the Ending the Long-gun Registry Act, by repealing the amendments made by the Economic Action Plan 2015 Act, No. 1, to retroactively restore the application of the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act to the records related to the registration of non-restricted firearms until the day on which this enactment receives royal assent;
(b) provides that the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act continue to apply to proceedings that were initiated under those Acts before that day until the proceedings are finally disposed of, settled or abandoned; and
(c) directs the Commissioner of Firearms to provide the minister of the Government of Quebec responsible for public security with a copy of such records, at that minister’s request.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you.

Ms. Rathjen, you mentioned certain shortcomings. I don't know whether you were referring to Bill C‑71 or Bill C‑21, which never saw the light of day, in the end. I'm talking about high-capacity magazines here.

Could you elaborate on these shortcomings, give us examples, if any, and tell us about the risk this could pose to public safety?

[Heidi Rathjen]

Thank you for the question.

Following the introduction of the former Bill C‑71, all of the key documents, all of the debates and all of the media coverage dealt with the RCMP's verification of the validity of the license. On the topic of verification, the documents indicated that the license numbers would be checked in the system to ensure that they were valid. This is not part of the regulations. The regulations only require the vendor to verify the photo and contact the RCMP. All that was required of the RCMP was that they be satisfied that the license was legal.

The wording used is problematic. The same was true of the language included in former Bill C‑19, where the requirement to verify the license was removed. It states that the seller must simply have no reason to believe that the buyer is not licensed. In this regard, the Barreau du Québec stated that it was extremely problematic to prove in court what a person had in mind.

It is a loophole that has the effect of cancelling the measure altogether. One can think here of what a future government might do. The Conservative Party, which was opposed to Bill C‑71, could require the RCMP to accept all applications without any verification. RCMP officials have testified before this committee that there will be a verification. I think it's a bit disingenuous to put that forward, because verification is an extremely subjective thing. All that is required of the RCMP is that they say they are satisfied.

In our view, this goes against what was promised. We found that Bill C‑71 was relatively weak. Yet one of the main reasons we supported it was precisely because it included this measure regarding license verification. The current draft regulations do not include this measure. So Canadians will not get the measure that was promised to them.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I thank the witnesses for being here. I regret that we do not have more time to discuss these issues. They are all outstanding witnesses who are very active advocates for gun control.

My special thanks to Ms. Rathjen and Mr. Benabdallah. I watched your webinar a few weeks ago, on the fifth anniversary of the massacre at the Quebec City grand mosque. The main point of that webinar was that, unfortunately, not much has been done by the federal government to control firearms.

I'll get right to the point.

Ms. Rathjen, I know that you've done a lot of work on the verification process used when someone wants to obtain a weapon. We were told by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, or RCMP, that they were going to proceed with the verification, and that would have been implemented in Bill C‑71. However, last summer, the draft regulations that were tabled rescinded the mandatory verification.

I'd like to hear your comments on the issue.

[Wendy Cukier, President, Coalition for Gun Control]

Thanks very much.

My name's Wendy Cukier. I'm the president of the Coalition for Gun Control, which is a network of 200 public safety community organizations and public health groups.

I am also the co-author of the book called The Global Gun Epidemic, with the past president of the American Public Health Association. I say that because I believe that a public health approach is the most appropriate way of looking at gun violence generally, and gang violence in particular.

When we think of gun violence, we can think of it as cancer. There are different forms. There's no one solution to all problems. If we're talking about domestic violence, if we're talking about suicide, if we're talking about mass shootings or if we're talking about gang violence, they all have a particular etiology or set of causes and solutions.

When we look at gang violence, I will say the following. I'm the head of the Diversity Institute and a full professor at Ryerson University. We've done a lot of work looking at the impact of disadvantage and inequality in Canada. There's no doubt that addressing the root causes of violence is absolutely critical. We know that certain youth are more at risk for gang violence [Technical difficulty—Editor] but that's not what I'm going to talk about today.

Today I'm going to talk about access to firearms, because while firearms do not cause violence, they increase lethality. The best example of this is a comparison between Canada, the United States, the U.K. and Australia. All of these countries have similar root causes. They all have inequality. They all have poverty. They all have racism. Canada, the U.K. and Australia have about the same rate per 100,000 of beatings, stabbings and other kinds of homicides. When it comes to gun violence, however, we see a profound difference. Last year, the U.K., which has twice as many people as Canada, had about 30 gun murders. Canada had 277, the highest number we've seen in many years.

The availability of firearms increases the likelihood that people will die. While it's true that when we look at the sources of guns that gangs use, we know that smuggling is part of the problem. We also know that the diversion of legal guns to illegal markets is a significant problem. Guns are diverted through theft, illegal sales and, in some instances, straw purchases. We saw in the last few days over 2,000 guns that were allegedly stolen recently. We've also seen a number of high-profile incidents like the Danforth shooting, where the gun that was used was from gang members and stolen in Saskatchewan.

There has been, over the last decade, a tremendous proliferation in the legal ownership of restricted weapons and handguns. There are now over a million legally owned in Canada by [Technical difficulty—Editor]. I want to underscore that we support the implementation of Bill C-71. We believe that licensing and tracking long guns is part of the solution and that we need a total ban on military assault weapons and that we need the buyback program.

Fundamentally, we need decisive action to stem the further proliferation of handguns in Canada. Part of that would be a ban on the import and sale of guns where the threat outweighs the utility. You don't use handguns for hunting. You don't need them for pest control on a farm. While arming for self-protection is apparently on the rise, it's not supported, for the most part, by Canadian law.

I want to reinforce one final point. You'll hear this person say, “Anyone can get a gun if they really want to”. You'll hear that person say, “Criminals don't register their guns”, and so on and so forth. I want to remind you that every illegal gun begins as a legal gun, either south of the border or in Canada.

[Heidi Rathjen, Coordinator, PolySeSouvient]

Thank you for giving me this opportunity to testify before the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.

Gun control is just one of many measures to reduce gun violence. There are different gun control measures that aim to prevent different types of crime, in all sorts of very different contexts. But since our group is made up of victims of mass shootings, our primary goal is to prevent similar tragedies.

The majority of mass killings are committed with legal weapons, mostly assault weapons, but also handguns. This is why we call for a ban on assault weapons and handguns, as well as a ban on high-capacity magazines.

And, given that the massacre at the École Polytechnique was linked to pure misogyny, and that mass shootings are closely associated with domestic violence, we also seek to keep guns away from violent spouses. Over two thirds of the mass shootings in the United States were perpetrated by aggressors that had a history of violence. That is why we are also calling for significant improvements in firearms licensing.

I will now touch on three areas that we feel need to be addressed.

The first is large-capacity magazines. The law passed in 1991 limited the number of cartridges in magazines to five for long guns and 10 for handguns, with some exceptions. Unfortunately, since then these exceptions, combined with new interpretations of the law and changes in the market, have accentuated major flaws in the laws and regulations.

Here are only two examples. First, the law allows magazines designed for more than the legal limit to be sold as long as a device blocks their number at the legal limit. However, according to the RCMP, these modifiable magazines are readily restorable to their full capacity. Many recent mass shooters legally purchased modifiable magazines and illegally converted them to their full capacity, including Justin Bourque, Richard Bain, Alexandre Bissonnette and Matthew Vincent Raymond.

The second is that the Conservative government in 2011 introduced a new interpretation of the 1991 law: If a magazine is not specifically designed for a gun in which it fits, it is exempted from the legal limits. There is zero public safety rationale behind this. In fact, the coroner who investigated the 2006 Dawson shooting said this loophole allowed the shooter to use a 10-bullet magazine for his restricted long gun, the Beretta Cx4 Storm, instead of a five-bullet one, suggesting that this could have made a difference.

The risks created by these flaws are as obvious as the urgency to fix them.

The second point I want to talk about is the verification of the validity of a potential buyer's licence. In 2015, the Liberals promised to reinstate the mandatory verification of a potential buyer's licence by the RCMP before the transfer of a non-restricted firearm. In 2018, the Liberal government introduced Bill C-71. The measure in the bill is described in official documents as follows:

C-71 provides that vendors must verify the firearms licence of the buyer, by contacting the Registrar of Firearms before transferring a non-restricted firearm. The Registrar would check the licence number in the Canadian Firearms Information System and issue a reference number if the licence is valid.

Running the licence number through the system is the only way to ensure that a licence is not counterfeit, stolen or revoked. A seller cannot check that themselves, and yet the regulations tabled last June require no such thing. According to the proposed regulations, once they check the photo on the buyer's licence, sellers will have to contact the RCMP to obtain a reference number authorizing the transfer. However, there is no obligation for a seller to provide any information whatsoever related to the buyer's licence to the RCMP, and there is no obligation stated anywhere in the laws and regulations that the RCMP has to run the licence number through the system.

This shocking loophole was confirmed to us in writing by Public Safety officials and to the Canadian press by a Public Safety spokesperson.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I agree with you on that.

Bill C‑71 and corresponding regulations are not clear about the verification process, and it is difficult to determine if it's well done or if all of the details that allow a person to obtain a firearm are checked.

I'd like to touch on another subject.

You've fought for a community approach instead of putting massive funds into law enforcement.

In your opinion, what do urban communities need to prevent criminal activity?

[Dr. Caillin Langmann]

BillC-71, in terms of [Technical Difficulty—Editor] in 2016, this recent study.... There's not enough data to look at any effects from any newer legislation.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Dr. Langmann, can you clarify something for me?

Your research ended in 2016, so you did not actually look at the impact of Bill C-71, which included extended background checks and forfeiture of firearms to the crown under a prohibition order. Can you confirm that your legislation ended prior to the introduction of Bill C-71?

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

You talked about a ban, and you also talked in your speech about bills C‑71 and C‑21. In your view, legislative gaps in relation to gun crime need to be closed.

In your view, what are these gaps?

As parliamentarians, how can we contribute to the debate and propose legislative solutions to the government?

[Chief Evan Bray, Chief of Police, Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair and members of this distinguished committee.

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today on behalf of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police. I co-chair a CACP special purpose committee on firearms that's been tasked to study growing concerns related to gun violence in Canada from a public safety perspective.

The debate on firearms, as we know, is a very polarizing one that can be highly divisive and emotionally charged on all sides of the issue. The CACP believes in balancing the privileges of individual Canadians with the broader rights of society. As police leaders, we place a priority on public safety and the protection of the most vulnerable among us. The committee is comprised of numerous experts from across Canada, working together to understand the complexities of firearm crime in our country. The CACP is working closely with organizations like Public Safety Canada, Canada Border Services Agency, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Canadian Firearms Program.

Combining our expertise in guns and gangs, investigative firearms tracing, statistics and other things opens the door to enhanced collaboration and information sharing. The committee identified four key themes that will help guide our work over the next couple of years: strategic approaches, legislative initiatives, education and prevention, and data collection and information sharing. Over the past two years we've provided feedback on firearm-related legislation, such as bills C-71 and C-21, to improve what is a strict and responsible form of gun ownership in Canada.

While we should always strive for continuous improvement with legislation, we also need to find ways of reducing gun violence in our communities using the best evidence-based practices. How crime guns make their way into our communities, the types of guns being used for criminal purposes, the perpetrators using guns to commit crimes, and other areas related to firearms can differ greatly across Canada. To ascertain how, when, why and where firearms are being used to commit crimes in Canada, we need good data. To this end, the special purpose committee on firearms worked with the Canadian Centre for Justice and Community Safety Statistics to ensure that good firearms data was being collected consistently across Canada. For example, in 2021, we set new standard definitions for firearms terminology related to shootings and crime guns. We also amended the Uniform Crime Reporting Survey to include new firearm codes that distinguish between seized, stolen and recovered firearms. The first results will be expected in the fall of this year.

Two large areas requiring further work are the origin of crime guns and firearm tracing in Canada. With our partners, we're conducting a study on the origins of crime guns to monitor trends and examine the effectiveness of policies and interventions. In parallel, we are also working to increase the uptake in capacity to complete firearm tracing. We want to understand the benefits and challenges with respect to the existing process in Canada to better inform operational steps and address legislative gaps related to gun crime. The issue is not law-abiding Canadians who want to own firearms. The issue really is people who are involved in criminal activity who are obtaining firearms through illegal means, such as cross-border trafficking, theft from legal gun owners and straw purchases. The absence of purchase records effectively stymies the ability of police to trace non-restricted firearms that have been used in a crime. Firearm tracing can assist in identifying the suspect in a crime and the criminal sourcing of that gun and any trafficking networks.

The disturbing trend in gun violence is largely related to gangs, lower-level street gangs and more sophisticated organized crime groups, so to stop it requires a whole-of-society approach. It starts with education and prevention early on to address the root causes that lead people to the gang lifestyle in the first place. It's about exit strategies for people in those lifestyles and leading them towards a healthier path. Finally, it's about enforcement and ensuring that we're going after the criminal elements who are perpetrating violence in our communities. We want to use proper investigative techniques, have them in place and have appropriate consequences for those who commit acts of violence.

In conclusion, we respect the debate that is occurring and understand the various positions on this issue. It's not our goal to punish law-abiding citizens for the actions of criminals. Our goal simply is to ensure the safety and security of all Canadians.

Thank you.

[Kellie Paquette]

Currently, restricted and prohibited firearms do require that validation of a licence. Through Bill C-71, as you've identified, for non-restricted firearms, it would be a requirement to have a valid licence and the registrar would validate that.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Thanks so much, Chair.

The RCMP mentioned the straw purchases. I'd like to go back, if I could, to the regulations in Bill C-71. When someone has come in to purchase a firearm and they have a licence, the seller is calling the RCMP. Do our regulations require that the RCMP check to see that it is a valid licence and make sure that it's not counterfeit?

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

That's great. Thank you.

I worked on Bill C-71 at committee. Prior to Christmas, we passed a motion to refer the regulations back to have them come into force. One of the things was that it would require someone selling firearms to check that the person purchasing a firearm from them had a licence. I was quite shocked that we weren't already doing that.

Can you confirm that these regulations we've put in place require someone selling those firearms to check that a purchaser of a firearm has a valid licence?

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Thank you so much.

Thank you to the officials who are here today.

I'd like to quickly use the rest of the time we have. I had distributed a notice of motion on Bill C-71. I know that the Conservative Party had made some amendments.

I'll just read an amended motion into the record, if I can. I move—

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Here's what I will tell you, Mr. Lloyd. The past president of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police called Bill C-71, which strengthened background checks for prospective buyers, essential. The Conservative Party opposed it. You vowed to repeal it.

The current president of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police supported our prohibition of military-style assault rifles, saying, “it ensures the safety of our members when they respond to calls for service.”