I was speaking to a police officer in a major city who said their police force undertook a major initiative focused on one community that was having severe gang problems. They knew who the offenders were. In this sweep, when they locked those gang members up, the homicide rate in that area, which was measurable, went completely flat. They were having serious gang and gun violence there and it dropped.
So that's a part of what this bill does. If you offend, if you use a gun to assault someone, if you use a firearm in the commission of a gang-related offence, you're going to jail. If you do it again, you're going to jail for a longer time; and if you do it again, you're going to jail for an even longer time. If someone doesn't get that message the second, third, or fourth time--with respect to what Elizabeth Fry is doing and so on--they're just not getting the other messages, whether they're resource-based or so on.
We have to send a message at some point that we value human lives that could be caught in the crossfire, we value people's property, and we value a safe society. If someone is going to repeatedly use a firearm to commit a criminal offence, at some point the protection of society comes into play. That's why this bill is incremental. It doesn't come down hard the first time; it's the second time, and the third time is worse.