Evidence of meeting #41 for Foreign Affairs and International Development in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was weapons.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Liberal
Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB
Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
Mesdames et messieurs, thank you for being here, and thank you for giving us the benefit of some interesting perspectives on what is certainly an important issue.
Mr. Torino or Mr. Bernardo, in your work representing your association, have you met with the foreign affairs minister?
Liberal
Executive Director, Canadian Shooting Sports Association
No.
Liberal
Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB
Have you met with a previous foreign affairs minister or any other federal minister?
Executive Director, Canadian Shooting Sports Association
That would be....
It goes back a ways.
Executive Director, Canadian Shooting Sports Association
Actually, in terms of meeting with a lot of the foreign affairs ministers, the answer is no.
Executive Director, Canadian Shooting Sports Association
We meet regularly with Minister Toews. We both sit on the firearms advisory committee. As Mr. Torino said, both of us have been on many of these committees, going right back into the Liberal tenure, because we're acknowledged experts in this field.
Liberal
Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB
But you haven't met with a foreign affairs minister or a secretary of state for foreign affairs, or perhaps a parliamentary secretary for foreign affairs, with respect to this treaty.
Executive Director, Canadian Shooting Sports Association
We have met with one minister. That was a few years ago now.
I'm sorry, I'm having a hard time remembering the name.
Liberal
Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB
Would it have been since the election of the Harper government in 2006?
Liberal
Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB
When you go back, would you be able to check your records and get back to the clerk with the name of the minister you met with?
Executive Director, Canadian Shooting Sports Association
Absolutely. I'm just having a momentary memory block.
Liberal
Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB
I'd like to ask a question of perhaps Mr. Epps, Mr. Fried, or peut-être Madame Holguin.
My colleague asked about the
…socio-economic criteria…
which I thought was an interesting perspective.
I think, Madame Holguin, you said in your comments that you would rather have no treaty at all than a weak treaty.
What concerns do you have about this treaty that would make it weak and thereby, in your view, ineffective?
I don't know if it was you or one of your colleagues who mentioned this.
Senior Program Officer, Project Ploughshares, and Member, Control Arms Coalition
I'll respond.
I may also pick up on the earlier reference to consensus as well. Certainly that is one of the issues we're very concerned about, because the rules of procedure are calling for a treaty agreed by consensus. There's great concern that what we will end up with as a result of consensus is a lowest common denominator document that will effectively be meaningless.
If we move towards that end, I think that's when we would say it would be best not to have a treaty than a weak document that would in fact put in place standards that would be much lower than those of many states, such as Canada, and would justify a lot of states continuing with their current operations around transfers.
I hope I've responded to your question.
