Evidence of meeting #114 for Public Safety and National Security in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was suicide.
A recording is available from Parliament.
As an Individual
Continue your sentence, because I want to know what you're referencing when you reference the firearms officer there.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Red Deer—Lacombe, AB
The chief firearms officer would have had a role to play in the issuing, the granting, of the licence in the first place.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Red Deer—Lacombe, AB
I think that's what the problem is.
When Mr. Goodale was before the committee in the last week that we sat, I asked him.... I said that he could get unanimous consent on this bill if we simply dealt with that licensing part and the background checks, expanding and strengthening that, and forewent the other parts of it. I asked if he would agree to that, and he said no. Would—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Mr. Calkins, unfortunately you have run through your time. This is an important question, and I'm sure Ms. Irons would like to answer it. Possibly during Ms. Dabrusin's last couple of minutes you might work in that answer, depending on Ms. Dabrusin.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
I would like to allow you to answer that question, so perhaps we can start there.
As an Individual
I vehemently disagree with the delegated authority of chief firearms officers to override those stage A failures for somebody with this sort of background.
However, as I said before, that's not the only difficulty we have in the licensing system right now, which is the Canadian firearms information system. I could go on, and I'm trying to keep my remarks narrow, but for example, I was told by one source that police forces across Canada and many individual police officers are not sufficiently familiar with the codes to use on occurrence reports to trigger a firearms hit in the firearms information system. That's one flaw. The inability of our infrastructure technologically across the country for small jurisdictions to send information to the systems is also a major flaw. It's not simply a matter of background checks. It's all the supports underneath them.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
Earlier you had touched on the fact that regulations play an important role in all of this as well.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
I'm not going to have the kind of time with you to go into it more, but perhaps you're able to respond in writing if you have suggestions of what you would like us to look at. What do you think should go into the regulations to make a more fulsome piece of legislation, from your perspective? You have about half a minute if you want to jump in.
As an Individual
Some of it is in my brief. Some of it pertains to who your PAL references can be. I don't think they should be immediate family members or close friends. Passport requirements are stricter, but you can't shoot somebody with a passport.
I've mentioned the stage A failure override and the system data, and I've also read, for example—although it's not confirmed and it's been in newspaper reports—that due to resource levels, references are rarely contacted, if ever. I don't know what sort of validation ever goes on to ensure they're appropriate to be providing a reference for somebody applying for a gun, and so on. There are many areas I could touch on.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
I think I'm out of time, but you can also provide us more—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you, Ms. Dabrusin.
To the witnesses, Ms. Irons and Mr. Gaudreault, thank you for coming before the committee and contributing to our study.
Just immediately prior to adjourning, colleagues, I intend to put before the House the unanimous report of the committee, and with colleagues' permission, I'm going to suggest that we call the chief of corrections to the committee in the fall to respond to the report.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
I'm going to do it tomorrow.
I suggest that in the fall, he or she come before the committee and respond to the committee so that we get some real response.
With that, the meeting is adjourned.
