Mr. Chair, on the morning of Sunday, April 19, my constituents and I awoke to a devastating tragedy that was playing out in our normally peaceful little corner of the world here in Cumberland—Colchester, Nova Scotia. It was a 13-hour rampage through the countryside, the largest mass shooting in the history of Canada, an act of violence by an angry, abusive man with a history of domestic violence and with access to guns—a lethal combination. It proves that private violence can become public violence and must be taken seriously as a danger to public safety.
I thank the Canadians who reached out to Nova Scotians from coast to coast in our time of grief. We now reach out as allies to denounce misogyny, systemic racism, casual cruelty and calculated brutality, because the fight for social justice never sleeps.