Foreign Affairs Committee on Nov. 2nd, 2017

[Steve Torino]

In terms of the international brokering, when we started to look at this, we realized that just about any company, any organization...Colt Canada I realize is strictly military, non-civilian, but could they be considered to be a broker? There are many elements here when anyone imports firearms. Canada is a nation of importers. We are not a nation of manufacturers, other than Savage. If you are ordering something from outside the country, are you therefore a broker? Again, as was said before, the devil is in the details and the regulations.

What exactly is a broker? Each country seems to be looking at it slightly differently. I noticed that at the UN. There were a lot of different interpretations about what is a real broker. Many of them are concerned with the real problems happening in the conflict areas. We're looking at ourselves here in Canada saying we don't have the same issues. Our levels of control are so much higher.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

I see that's your first concern which you noted, but especially in Mr. Farrant's testimony, there was a different concern that he seemed to concentrate on.

Mr. Farrant, you raised concern over the possible creation of a gun registry in Canada, notwithstanding the fact that it's been made clear by the parliamentary secretary, by the minister, by the government, publicly declared—and, in fact, you quoted the parliamentary secretary several times—where we've made it absolutely clear this is not about doing that. In fact, there's no wording that claims that.

You referenced article 12, which requires a state party to have a domestic national record-keeping system. We've had a system like that since 1947, which Mr. O'Toole referenced, since World War II. We've had a record-keeping system under the EIPA. These record-keeping obligations are familiar to all Canadians involved in the legitimate trade of arms. These are not new requirements that will be changed in any way by Bill C-47. Given those facts, and all the declarations that have been made, it's clear that the bill will do a number of things, but one of the things it will not do is create a new registry.

Do you agree?

[Greg Farrant]

Not entirely.

I do agree, and here I'm parsing a fine line. There was a lot of discussion during debate, and I believe the phrase that was used was “backdoor registry”. Do we believe that this is a backdoor registry? No.

What is absent to make it such is the wording that when it comes to inventory...and it talks about inspectors at all reasonable times being able to go in and look at inventories, etc., for compliance. What's missing from that, which would make it into something of a backdoor registry, is the wording that the minister may demand that the inventories in their entireties that are kept by these groups or individuals be turned over to the government. That would be something different.

The fact that article 12 refers to end-users, we interpret that—maybe correctly, perhaps not—as me, Mr. Torino, anybody who has firearms in this country being the end-user if they are the ones purchasing them, or the ammunition, or the components and parts and whatnot. That section 3 of article 12 starts to get very close to some of the language that used to be associated with Bill C-68 when the long-gun registry was still in effect in this country. That is a bit of a concern for us.

Does the bill create that? I have to say quite fairly, no. However, depending on what the regulatory attachments are to the bill, if there's any indication in those regulatory attachments that the government can at will, or on demand, require those records to be turned over, which includes not only perhaps inventory but sales, then we have more of an issue at that time.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

So it's clear, and I think this is an important point, you have just acknowledged that quite clearly the way it's written, the legislation does not create a gun registry.

[Greg Farrant]

That's correct, but there are also several warning shots in there that we have to be careful of.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you, Mr. Wrzesnewskyj. Your time is up.

Ms. Laverdière, it's your turn.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Gentlemen, thank you for being here today.

If I remember correctly, we met before, in 2012. You appeared before the committee at an information session on negotiations for the Arms Trade Treaty. You were able to share your concerns, which you had an opportunity to present again when you accompanied the Canadian delegation to those negotiations.

I must admit that at the time the Liberal members and we, the members of the NDP, had a lot of trouble understanding why the Conservative government only brought your organizations to New York to take part in these negotiations, and avoided bringing other very well-known organizations such as Project Ploughshares, and others who worked on these issues for years and had acquired great expertise. It seems to us, and we continue to think, that this was not a very balanced representation of Canadian civil society.

Honestly, we have some concerns regarding this bill which are rather different from yours. These concerns are very well summarized in an analysis of the bill done by Michael Byers from the Rideau Institute. The subtitle of that study is interesting. It is “An Act to facilitate arms exports to countries which violate human rights?”

I want to take advantage of having the floor to say that it would be very interesting to have this document distributed to all of the members of this committee for information. I also had the opportunity of asking for it—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

I will give it to everybody on the committee.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I will table it officially. I don't know if it is clear enough. The other document was prepared by a group of civil society organizations. In it, these organizations express their 10 main concerns regarding the bill. I think that these two documents will be very useful tools for the members of the committee.

I'd like to get back to Mr. Byers. Can the clerk confirm that he was invited to the committee? I believe he was on our list of witnesses. Did he agree to come and present his point of view on the bill to us? We have had him before the committee a few times, and I think he can contribute some very interesting expertise.

I would like to raise a related topic that is not directly connected to today's study.

In Quebec recently, we have been hearing about a group of gun owners who are opposed to the Quebec gun registry. They are conducting quite a virulent campaign against PolySeSouvient, or Poly Remembers. This very well-known Quebec organization was created following the horrible Polytechnique massacre that was perpetrated against women, as you will recall. This informal group of gun owners pirated the Poly Remembers Facebook page. It sends photographs of guns to survivors of the Polytechnique massacre. It has also sent hate messages and made threats against some of the survivors of the massacre.

I would like to know whether you condemn this type of action.

[Steve Torino]

Thank you.

I have tried not to follow this on purpose, because the Canadian Shooting Sports Association is not involved with those organizations. I think that any legal way of protesting is necessary in a free and democratic society such as we have in Canada. When it goes too far, I believe that the authorities then start to take a look at things. Beyond that, I don't think I can answer that question.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Thank you.

I am done, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

Mr. Saini, please.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Good morning, gentlemen.

Thank you very much for coming. I think it's very important that we hear your perspectives.

I want to pick on what my colleague Mr. Wrzesnewskyj said, and I will follow up with what Mr. O'Toole said.

We have three major articles in our regime right now. Article 5 of the ATT requires a state party to “establish and maintain a national control system”, which we're already doing. We have been following article 12 since 1947 and article 13 since 1993.

I'm wondering what you think, because you talk about a gun registry and you're talking about regulation maybe. I'm unclear where you see anything extra happening when it's already being followed.

[Greg Farrant]

I'll speak to that if I may, Mr. Chair.

I think you've just pointed out the very concern that we have. I'll grant you that if those are already in place, I understand your question, but the problem is that without exemptions in this piece of legislation, and the exemption we're asking for is a very simple one, a very straightforward one, and one that echoes what the parliamentary secretary said in his remarks during debate repeatedly, all of the articles you've just cited now have the potential, and I stress “potential”, to become something else in this country, depending on what the regulatory regime attached to Bill C-47 becomes, and we don't know what that's going to be. I'll give you an example, if I may. This is hypothetical, obviously.

If the government, through regulation, included some sort of provision for the minister at his discretion to demand, request, or whatever, certain records, that in itself would start to veer towards constituting something that we had before and do not have right now. I recognize these three articles you quoted, and one we already talked about, article 12, has language in it that is of concern in terms of inventories, in terms of the information that it requires of individuals and organizations, or “persons and organizations” as they refer to it. We remain concerned about those articles themselves without some sort of clarification in our national legislation that would address it.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I would like to read something for you, because I think it's important. The United States, as you know, has signed the treaty. They have not yet ratified it, but former U.S. secretary of state John Kerry said:

I also want to be clear about what this treaty is not about. This treaty will not diminish anyone’s freedom. In fact, the treaty recognizes the freedom of both individuals and states to obtain, possess, and use arms for legitimate purposes. Make no mistake, we would never think about supporting a treaty that is inconsistent with the rights of Americans, the rights of American citizens, to be able to exercise their guaranteed rights under our constitution. This treaty reaffirms the sovereign right of each country to decide for itself, consistent with its own constitutional and legal requirements, how to deal with the conventional arms that are exclusively used within its borders.

Also, during that negotiation process—and Mr. Torino may have more information because he was the adviser—there were certain key U.S. red lines during that time. One of them, as you are quite aware, is:

The Second Amendment to the Constitution must be upheld. There will be no restrictions on civilian possession or trade of firearms otherwise permitted by law or protected by the U.S. Constitution.

You know how important this issue is in the United States. I'm just wondering how you would comment on that when they were quite clear in their comments that this would not affect anything domestically in their country.

[Steve Torino]

If I may attempt to answer, the issue here is that the Arms Trade Treaty does not include what we call conventional arms as well. It includes small arms and light weapons, and everyone present at the conference, which went on for a very long time, were very clear that civilian firearms of any kind, ammunition, accessories, and so forth, had to be included in there to make a joint package.

The problem with the Arms Trade Treaty always has been and always will be that one size does not fit all. What we do in North America is not the same as what's going on in some other places where they have serious conflict issues, and where weapons of all types are flowing freely back and forth, with the agreement of the government or not, no one knows, and I don't think that's of issue here. This is one part of it that is very much of concern.

Canada does not have a registry of non-restricted firearms. That was cancelled in April 2012. The treaty does refer to keeping records of all types of firearms and weapons of all sorts. Mr. Farrant referred to that before. There's a giant hole there. What our members are afraid of is that this will come back somehow as what was referred to as a backdoor registry, and if not that, at least possibly a curtailment of imports into Canada of various and sundry products that would affect the community.

Canada also does not have the right to say that we want consensus on the treaty. It's a simple majority vote, and 75% of the members present at any Arms Trade Treaty conference in the future can change it. If Canada votes against, we would fall within the 25% that would not agree to it, but it would still pass, and this might affect us in Canada. These are concerns that we're raising to the committee, and nothing more than that.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I'm glad you mentioned that because Canada's also part of the Wassenaar Arrangement which, I think, has been very beneficial.

I know I have very limited time, but I just want to correct the records. My friend, Mr. O'Toole, said that the top four countries have not signed the treaty, but that's actually incorrect. Germany and France, which are two of the top five exporters, have signed and ratified the treaty.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

Mr. Sidhu, go ahead, please.

[Jati Sidhu, Liberal, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for coming in front of the committee.

Let's go back to the 75% concern that Mr. Torino has. Anywhere in the world...actually, there are three thresholds: 51%, 66%, and 75%. Even countries or associations that don't have any constitution...people go by the book Robert's Rules of Order and I haven't seen anything beyond the 75% majority. What are you suggesting? If you're not really happy, a 75% majority can change things around, and then we fall back into 25%. What can we do as a country?

[Steve Torino]

I think that when Canada is affected by something, they must still be part of the treaty and they must still agree with what's been passed and implemented by the 75% majority. If not, their choice is to get out of the treaty, but up to the date that they get out of the treaty, they must still abide by the changes made. That is in the Arms Trade Treaty itself, that you must abide by the decisions as long as you are part of it. You can get out, if you don't like what's going to happen in the future, but as of at that point, you must agree with what's happening.

It's an issue. It's raising a concern to this committee that is involved with finally deciding which way C-47 will go. I thought it was necessary to bring this up to the committee.

[Jati Sidhu, Liberal, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

You're telling me we have a problem with that, but going forward, what's a cure? Sitting aside, out of any negotiation, doesn't get you anywhere. If you still have to abide by what they pass, 75% majority you have to come along, I don't think it's appropriate not to be part of the treaty.

[Steve Torino]

I never suggested that. As far as I'm concerned, I think that Canada's going to sign on to the treaty, so I'm just raising the issue here at this point because it is a possible concern for the future.

Mr. Farrant raised issues of possible concern for the future. CSSA is doing the same thing.

[Jati Sidhu, Liberal, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Mr. Farrant, the accession to ATT will not impact domestic gun owners. You mentioned that. It will only limit the ability for foreign countries to use Canadian-made arms to commit human rights offences. Could you please explain to the committee how ATT is going to affect gun ownership? Do you have any examples of how the addition to ATT affected any other countries?

[Greg Farrant]

I want to be very clear. We do believe the ATT will affect small end-users, small legal, law-abiding firearms owners in this country, because of some of the language in the ATT.

As for what happens in other countries, it is not either the mandate of my organization or really our concern. Our concern is Canadian, in particular Ontario, firearms owners, users, hunters, recreational shooters, etc.

We believe that such language, in several articles in the ATT—and we're not suggesting that Canada should or shouldn't sign on to the ATT. What we are looking for is some level of certainty and some level of protection, if you will—I hate to use that word—within C-47 that simply ensures there are exemptions for the recreational shooting and hunting communities in this country. We think that can be achieved through a small amendment to C-47.

We're not sitting here in judgment of the entire treaty, nor are we sitting in judgment of Canada's decision to sign the treaty going forward. Certainly, we wouldn't be so arrogant as to make that overarching recommendation. We're just seeking some protections because of language in the treaty and the lack of similar protections in the bill that would offset some of the provisions in the treaty, in our view. That's simply all we're looking for here. We're not making statements about what Canada should or shouldn't do.