Evidence of meeting #14 for Public Safety and National Security in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was firearm.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
November 24th, 2011 / 11:50 a.m.
Conservative
Garry Breitkreuz Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK
Thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity to participate.
I think one of the disservices that has been done in this whole discussion is that gun control has been equated with, or the terms have been interchangeable with, the gun registry and with Bill C-68, and nothing could be further from the truth.
Professor Mauser, I want to follow up what my colleague asked you about. I have staff sergeants in my constituency who have voluntarily come to me and told me that they have instructed their officers not to consult the registry. One of the statements you made is that the registry has reduced the effectiveness of police. I would like you to elaborate on that.
The second thing I'd like you to elaborate on is the fact that the U.S. rate for homicides has fallen more rapidly than the Canadian rate. I find that interesting.
Maybe you could comment on both of those.
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
Yes. Thank you very much for your question.
First of all, it is arguable that if gun control is effective in any sense, the only way it can be effective is by limiting access to firearms. That is a very different approach. In the United States, they also have gun control, but it is not designed to limit the access to firearms.
Homicide rates have fallen faster in the U.S. during the 1990s and the 2000s. They have a set of laws that encourages law-abiding citizens to own and carry firearms. That has now covered virtually all of the states in the United States. If that were a threat to peace, their homicide rate should have increased. It did not.
Our gun control has attempted to criminalize formerly law-abiding citizens—hunters, target shooters—and restrict access to firearms on the assumption, as I've said, that doing so will decrease homicides. It has not; it cannot be shown that it has.
Second, the basic notion of police is not that of a military occupying force. The basic notion of police is to cooperate with the policed. Sir Robert Peel, when he started the police, made a very clear statement that the police and the policed must cooperate for effectiveness and efficiency. The police, certainly in all Anglo-Saxon countries, argue that they must cooperate and encourage cooperation with the police.
Bill C-68, by criminalizing law-abiding citizens, has created a breach, a rupture, between citizen and police. This discourages contact with the police. It discourages cooperation and in that sense decreases the effectiveness.
A third point—and I get back to the point that was asked before about trusting the registry—is that data as presented by computers, and to all people, not just to police, has a worshipful quantity. In data processing, we call it “garbage in, gospel out”. You can put anything in. The weak part of the registry—and of licensing, for that matter—is that there has been very little verification and very little check on the data that goes in.
Your own earlier ATIs, Mr. Breitkreuz, show just how many errors and omissions are in the registry and in the licensing system. Nevertheless, when a normal person looks at a computer-generated display, it looks as though it must be true—the government, the computer—doesn't it? It's not. That puts officers' lives at risk.
Conservative
Garry Breitkreuz Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK
Thank you very much.
Mr. Illerbrun, here is a quick question.
NDP
The Vice-Chair NDP Randall Garrison
Mr. Breitkreuz, your time has expired.
We'll turn now to Mr. Scarpaleggia.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Thank you.
Mr. Mauser, you mentioned that the suicide rate has been going down.
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
Yes.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Perhaps you're correct, but you're aware that the interparliamentary committee on compassionate and palliative care released its report last week. I'm looking at the stats in the chapter on suicide prevention. The stats I'm seeing are that in 2007 suicides were 3,611; in 2006, 3,512; and in 2005, 3,743. It seems to be bouncing up and down. You're saying there's an actual downward trend in suicides?
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
In terms of actual number of suicides, the numbers, as you correctly state, are increasing. In 1991 there were 3,593 suicides in Canada. In 2008, in the most recent number, there were 3,700. As you also realize, the population in Canada has increased substantially since 1991, so the rates have gone down while the raw numbers have increased.
The key question, of course, is the methodology, but you have not asked me that.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
You're saying that there's a downward trend in per capita suicides.
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
That's correct.
Liberal
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
The population has increased, as you know.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
But the RCMP, in one of its case studies, has said that firearms were twice as likely to have been present in the homes of suicide victims than in the homes of suicide attempters and a control group. I guess you would dispute that study.
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
You notice they did not say that the firearms were involved in the homicide.... Many houses outside of urban areas have firearms in them. If the person committed suicide with a rope, a knife, gas, whatever, the fact that there is a firearm in the house is as instructive as if there is a washing machine.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
So you're saying that there is no correlation between firearms in a home and suicide?
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
Suicide researchers around the world dispute the argument that firearms are linked to suicide, that firearms ownership or access is associated with suicide rates. As you know, we have a serious social problem in Canada with aboriginal communities. They prefer hanging to shooting, and gun control is least effective on native reserves.
Liberal
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
Do I believe in minimum sentencing...? I think Canada would be safer if we put serious and repeat offenders in jail for a longer period of time. That also gives them access to rehabilitative programs, so yes, I support--
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
--keeping serious offenders in jail longer.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Serious offenders? Okay.
Again, I don't understand why you basically dismissed Mr. Blais' research. It was peer-reviewed by--
Professor Emeritus, Institute for Canadian Urban Research Studies, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual
The journal that he—
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Excuse me. I'd like to finish my question, Mr. Mauser.
