Evidence of meeting #18 for Public Safety and National Security in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was firearm.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Member of the Legislative Assembly, McIntyre-Takhini, and Minister of Environment, Government of Yukon
The last comment I heard from our member of Parliament was that his hands are tied.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brant, ON
Okay. What you're saying, then, is that his leader, Mr. Michael Ignatieff, is saying he must vote a certain way.
Member of the Legislative Assembly, McIntyre-Takhini, and Minister of Environment, Government of Yukon
Yes.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brant, ON
What you're saying here today, just to be sure, is that he's not representing the first nations people of the Yukon.
Member of the Legislative Assembly, McIntyre-Takhini, and Minister of Environment, Government of Yukon
Well, I'll put it to you this way: if tomorrow morning he was going to face an election in our community, and it was based on his getting re-elected, and he was voting no, he wouldn't be down here in Ottawa.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brant, ON
I appreciate your saying that.
I don't know, Mr. Chair, whether it's appropriate that this go into the record or not, but here is a letter from the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations. Some 71 aboriginal leaders within Saskatchewan have signed this letter, sent to their member of Parliament and also copied to the Prime Minister of the country, wishing to see the current system of long-gun registry abolished for something that could be possibly better than this system.
Are you aware of this letter from the first nations people of Saskatchewan?
Member of the Legislative Assembly, McIntyre-Takhini, and Minister of Environment, Government of Yukon
Actually, I was just made aware of it today.
I could tell you probably with great certainty that if we were to go to every chief in the Yukon, the answer would be to abolish this.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brant, ON
I'll just point out too that I live in an area of the country, southwestern Ontario, which is fairly significantly populated, yet the opinion of my chief, the elected band council chief—that would be Chief Bill Montour—is the same. He said he'd be willing to come and testify to that on behalf of the largest first nation in Canada. This is a group of first nations people living within what I would call an urbanized part of our country, not in the far north. They see this as something that's been foisted upon them and as something that is not very efficient or effective in their own community.
The other point I'd like to pick up on—and perhaps this is to you, Chief Rich—is that as we've listened to testimony, I think there is a desire to have something that's effective and efficient by way of gun control. We're not against gun control, not at all. Former police chief MacKenzie brought up the system of interviewing people. Guns are dangerous in the hands of criminals, and it isn't the guns, but the person behind the gun. The chief articulated that well in a discussion with his friend--I won't use the same words you used, Minister--and that's been said several times. I'm just wondering—
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brant, ON
The question is about licensing and stiffening up the requirements to get a licence to own a gun. Can you make comments on that?
Chief Constable, Abbotsford Police Department
If I were picking between the two, I would put my money into who gets a licence. To me that's the biggest single issue, as well as aggressively reviewing whether people have become unstable or involved in domestic violence or are mentally ill. It's all of those issues. That's where I would put my money.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Garry Breitkreuz
We have about three and a half minutes left, Mr. Holland, if you would like to use that time.
Liberal
Mark Holland Liberal Ajax—Pickering, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
We register our car. We register our boat. We register our dog. The reality is that registration of all of those things, and of guns, is an important tool. Nobody would suggest that registering a car alone is going to save drivers from accidents in itself, but we recognize when we have to stand in line at the DMV, as I did yesterday, that it's part of the process and it's part of being in a democratic society and having the privilege of being able to use a car or a boat, or to have a pet, or to own a gun.
When we have the Canadian Police Association, which elects its executive--by the way, every single one of us at this table is elected—challenged as somehow unrepresentative of the people who elected them, or have our system of representative democracy challenged, then I have an issue.
When we have the Canadian Police Association come to us and say that they need this to do their job; when we have the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police say that this is important to them and that we need it to keep our communities safe; when we have medical professionals come forward in a nearly unanimous fashion—in fact, there isn't a single one who says otherwise--saying that we need to keep this registry because it helps save lives; when we have all of these individuals come forward and have the head of the police boards across the country say that this is essential; when the Auditor General tells us that all of this costs $4.1 million a year; when we know that police are using it 11,805 times a day—
Liberal
Mark Holland Liberal Ajax—Pickering, ON
No, Mr. Chair, let me finish, please. I'm leading up to a question.
Conservative
Brent Rathgeber Conservative Edmonton—St. Albert, AB
I'm just curious whether we're going to hear a question anytime before the end of this period.
Liberal
Mark Holland Liberal Ajax—Pickering, ON
That's not a point of order. Think of this just for a second—all of that.
Liberal
Mark Holland Liberal Ajax—Pickering, ON
Think of it. It's overwhelming that it's being used more than 11,000 times a day.