Evidence of meeting #119 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 licence.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Olivier Champagne  Legislative Clerk, House of Commons
Randall Koops  Director General, Policing and Firearms Policy, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Paula Clarke  Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
Rob O'Reilly  Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Nicole Robichaud  Counsel, Department of Justice

12:50 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal John McKay

We're on to CPC-9.

Mr. Motz.

12:50 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

Chair, the intent of CPC-9 is to address the background checks and to have the lifetime background check on a new applicant, or someone who has not held a continuous licence, or has a firearms licence that has lapsed or been sought at a later date.

I am proposing that clause 2 be amended by adding, after line 4 on page 2, the following:

(2) Section 5 of the Act is amended by adding the following after subsection (2): (2.1) For the purposes of determining eligibility under subsection (2), in the case of an individual who is applying to renew a firearms licence or who has held a firearms licence within the previous year, only the previous five years shall be taken into account.

The government has sought to introduce lifetime background checks, notwithstanding the obvious issues that many law-abiding firearm owners don't pose a problem, as we know. They are not the problem. Criminals are the issue, but criminals usually don't seek firearms through applying for a licence, so it would seem unnecessary to have conditions on that lifetime background check.

Current firearm licence owners have been subjected to a five-year continuous screening from the time they apply and get accepted for their firearm licence. As you described on Tuesday, Mr. O'Reilly, they are having those 400 UCR codes, uniform crime reporting codes, being checked on a continuous basis. These people are already probably the most closely scrutinized and monitored of any other group in the country, I would dare say. Firearms owners are more closely watched by this government than probably the untold number of ISIS terrorists who have returned to our country.

That's true. It is. They don't get subjected to daily checks.

12:50 p.m.

Liberal

Peter Fragiskatos Liberal London North Centre, ON

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, is that really relevant?

We disagree very strongly on this subject—that falsehood—but let's stay within the scope of the—

12:50 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

That's okay. We disagree.

Thank you.

To make this bill more in line with the actual goal, which is to keep firearms away from those who should not have them, I would submit that background checks should only be carried out at first-time applications, where the individual has not been subjected to continuous screening. Once someone has held a licence, whether that be for five years or 20 or 30 years, they are already basically under background checks and have been for the life of their firearms licence anyway.

This would provide the objective of ensuring that people get the background check they need before getting a firearms licence, and reasonable background checks follow afterwards, which is what we intend to have happen in the first place.

That is the reason for that amendment. It will provide the opportunity to do exactly what we want to have happen in legislation. That is, those who should not have a firearms licence do not get a firearms licence, and those who already have a firearms licence and are not flagged, and do not pose a threat to public safety, they are the majority of Canadians, who are the law-abiding kind of owners. If we're going to do a background check as extensive as is being proposed, it is for those coming forward, or those who have had a lapse in their licence, not for those who currently have a licence.

12:55 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal John McKay

Thank you, Mr. Motz.

Ms. Damoff.

12:55 p.m.

Liberal

Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON

I'll be quick, Chair. We're not going to be supporting the amendment. It doesn't follow the intent of the bill to follow a lifetime and I listened to Mr. Motz and his rationale, but we won't be supporting it.

12:55 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal John McKay

Mr. Calkins.

12:55 p.m.

Conservative

Blaine Calkins Conservative Red Deer—Lacombe, AB

I have a question for the officials.

Does the department have any statistics or evidence to suggest that people who have had a firearms licence—even going back to the firearms acquisitions certificate days, the early days—are problematic from a public safety perspective?

12:55 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

Unfortunately, I have nothing to support that notion.

12:55 p.m.

Conservative

Blaine Calkins Conservative Red Deer—Lacombe, AB

Okay, because we don't have any evidence to suggest that people who have had a firearms licence for 20 years and have reapplied successfully two or three times.... I don't know why my colleagues across the way would be unsupportive of this. This is probably going to be an amendment that will, politically, gain the most wins for my colleagues who are proposing this bill in the first place. I don't sense that there's any public safety value added, as just mentioned by Mr. O'Reilly, so I'm wondering why there wouldn't be consent to pass this amendment.

As one of the few people at this table who actually has a possession and acquisition licence, I'm continually vetted. I get checked out every time I reapply for my licence. It's only valid for five years and I'm going to have a lifetime history of having that licence, hopefully. I'm not sure why, the next time I go to reapply for my licence, somebody is going to go back to when I was 18 years old. It doesn't seem to make any sense, when I've established 20 years of credibility as a law-abiding licensed firearms owner.

This is kind of the crux of why Bill C-71 is not being accepted broadly by the current law-abiding firearms community, and I wholeheartedly suggest the government reconsider this. There's no evidence to suggest that this is going to add anything to public safety whatsoever.

12:55 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal John McKay

Mr. Motz.

12:55 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

Chair, just to echo the comments that were made by my colleague, we do know from the stats from Statistics Canada and other studies that have been done, that current licensed firearm owners pose the lowest risk to public safety, lower even than those who don't have a PAL. Those who don't have a firearms licence have a greater probability of committing an offence than those who do. I believe it was by one-third.

We do know that less than 3% of those who have a firearms licence, based on the evidence of testimony that was provided to us at this committee, have actually ever committed a criminal offence once they've had a PAL.

The intent of this is to ensure that those who should not have a firearm on first instance don't receive one, which is what we have currently in legislation. The current legislation and even the proposed Bill C-71 will ensure that if someone does have a licence and commits an offence, they then will have that licence removed or be unable to renew it and have their firearms taken away.

What this does, however, for individuals who have a licence already, and as has been said, who already go through the most stringent scrutiny of any law-abiding group in our society, is make it unnecessary to have a full lifetime check moving forward. It should only be applied to those who are receiving a firearms licence for the first time or those who have let it lapse for more than a year and have to reapply. That's reasonable. Firearm owners are not opposed to background checks that weed out those who pose a threat to public safety.

The issue is how it would be applied if you have, as Mr. O'Reilly said, 2.1 million PAL licences in this country, or thereabouts. At the five-year renewals—and there's no costing around this—someone now will have to do a full background check for the lifetime of that individual, and they may have had a licence for 20 years, but now, all of a sudden, we're going to impose this on them, and it is a cost. It is a delay.

I'd like to have our officials weigh in to provide some clarity as to whether or not this sort of application makes sense and upholds the intention of keeping firearms away from those who shouldn't have them and prevents unnecessary and onerous background checks on those who are already qualified.

1 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal John McKay

Is Mr. Motz's question clear?

1 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

Kind of.

The only point I would make, Mr. Motz, is that you've used the term “background checks” quite a bit in reference to the five-year period. The five-year period certainly does apply to the background checks, but the current eligibility goes beyond just the background checks, the exclusive criminality. So when we look to 5(2)(a), “convicted or discharged”, 5(2)(b) speaks to mental health and violence. That isn't caught as part of a traditional background check, or 5(2)(c), which is a history of behaviour. I think what's intended here, in terms of expanding that, is that the eligibility in terms of what is being considered go beyond just the core background check to include other behaviours that may not be expressly as a result of a discharge or a conviction.

On an application or a renewal, there's a portion of the application that relates to self-disclosure. The self-disclosure goes to other mental health issues or loss or breakdowns in one's relationship, so the expansion of 5(2) to lifetime would bring those other elements into consideration beyond just the core background check.

You were correct when you said the other day that the background check is capturing the criminality, the things that generate FIPs, but it excluded certain other portions that would necessarily be considered as well under, for example, 5(2)(b) and 5(2)(c).

1 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

True, but in 5(2), as it currently reads, it covers off the things you just mentioned that a CFO will currently look at.

1 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

But the whole notion of a background check really specifically relates to criminal records check and that really is only covered under the 5(2)(a) at that point, so criminal background checks are things that would come out of CPIC and be exclusively flagged.

For example, things under 5(2)(b) relating to mental health issues and violence go slightly beyond that.

1 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

In my conversation if I used “background checks”, and it was not what was proposed in the amendment, I apologize for that.

Again, the amendment is about determining eligibility under subsection 5(2). That would cover off all the things you just mentioned. It covers all of those things that exist there now and what is in an amendment that we just passed, LIB-1. It would cover those off. It's not just a background check. The bill talks about enhanced background checks over the lifetime of an individual, but I'm just talking about the licence renewal eligibility, or even the eligibility in the first place. Again, I apologize for using the term “background check” because it talks about criminality there.

All of the application precessing determining eligibility for acquiring a firearm under this amendment is specific to, if you have a licence already, we're saying that there's no need to have the lifetime and [Inaudible—Editor] enhanced one because, as you've already demonstrated, 5(2) already does the things you just finished saying it does already. It checks all those things already on eligibility and it shouldn't apply to those individuals who already have a licence or let it lapse within a year. It should apply to those who are getting a new licence or who have let in lapse for longer than a year. That's what I'm getting at, so it's not background checks.

Given that new parameter, do you see a value to this? Are you aware of any concerns that this amendment would pose to public safety or that would make it difficult to proceed with?

1:05 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

I can't answer the question in terms of perceived risk to public safety. All I can say is that the amendments you are putting forward right now would therefore, on somebody who is renewing their application, on personal history questions about previous incidents, exclude things that may have occurred six years ago, as an example.

There would be an impact in terms of what would be disclosed by the individual—

1:05 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

No, that's not true because—

1:05 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

Sorry, then I misinterpreted.

1:05 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

When someone applies for a licence now, the CFO goes through their whole eligibility requirements and they've taken all those things into consideration already. Have they not? It's besides the criminality.

1:05 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

The firearms allocation right now only requires individuals to disclose things within the last five years, so no, they would not necessarily take further things into consideration because the firearms application right now requires individuals to disclose the last five years.

1:05 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

But you said in testimony either today or on Tuesday that nothing precludes the CFOs from going beyond five years in their scope now.

1:05 p.m.

Director, Firearms Regulatory Services, Canadian Firearms Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Rob O'Reilly

That's if they are made aware of it.

1:05 p.m.

Conservative

Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB

Right.