Public Safety Committee on June 14th, 2018

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Blaine.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Just so I'm clear on what the intention of paragraph c) is, I would argue that there is some merit there, but I want to be clear that this would prohibit, in various defence magazines and publications and various other publications that deal with hunting or whatever the case might be, such as Outdoor Canada, any advertising by firearms manufacturers to promote the sales of their firearms.

Is that what the intention of paragraph c) is?

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

No. That goes beyond what the intention is. It says “examine whether it is reasonable”. To clarify on the wording as to what this is, it's not a prohibition within this motion. It's to examine whether it's reasonable. It's about glorifying violence and simulating warfare. This is about violence against people. That's what the intention is about.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

It has no intention, then, regarding restricting a commercial manufacturer who is looking for military procurement, for example? We see it all the time in the Hill Times and others where a defence organization or defence manufacturer is advertising fighter jets—which, by the way, have firearms on them—or anything else for that matter.... Is that what we're going to be proscripting here?

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Going back to this, it says:

the Government of Canada examine whether it is reasonable for commercial firearms manufacturers to promote the sales of their wares, namely restricted and prohibited weapons, in a manner that particularly glorifies violence and simulates warfare.

I think the key word here is “reasonable”. That's right in there.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

No, I understand, and I understand that what one might find reasonable another might find unreasonable. To my knowledge, virtually every military firearm is probably restricted or prohibited. I would guess that anybody who is advertising defence equipment would be reasonably seen to be potentially talking about violence or warfare.

Are you certain this is the wise choice to put into the current wording? I'm not so sure.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

I have eminent faith in the word “reasonable” and how it is interpreted legally. I am happy to keep it there, yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Mr. Paul-Hus, and then Mr. Spengemann.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Basically, I only want to emphasize what my colleague Mr. Calkins just mentioned.

The way in which the French version is worded is very insidious and could have an impact on police forces, police magazines and National Defence. Even companies like Irving will no longer be able to announce frigates, because they are weapons of war.

The impact of this could be much broader then you intended. We have to be cautious.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Mr. Spengemann.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Mr. Chair, without formally proposing this as an amendment, I'm wondering if we would consider adding the word “civilian” so that it would read “promote the civilian sales of their wares”. I think that captures some, maybe most, of what my colleagues are concerned about.

I'm not sure if my colleague would contemplate that as a—

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Is that a helpful clarification?

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Potentially.

[A voice]

Potentially.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

I don't see any willingness to debate this further.

Do we work the word “civilian” into the motion as a formal amendment?

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

I'm not bringing it as a formal amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Okay, there is no formal amendment. Therefore, the motion stands as it is.

(Motion as amended agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Next up is Ms. Damoff.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Chair, my colleagues across the way said that we're playing politics here. The only party that's been playing politics with this bill has been the Conservative Party. I find it really frustrating, especially after speaking this morning to a group of women's shelters, and looking at them, to not have their voice mentioned by the Conservatives over there. It's really frustrating.

In the motion I brought forward, the first one is dealing with regulations. The other two are dealing with issues that are provincial and territorial and that therefore the government cannot pass laws on, but we've heard enough testimony on it to feel that it's important that the minister speak to his colleagues and work together to try to remedy these situations.

The last part of the motion, d), is based on testimony we heard regarding storage, that there are issues with it. It's not saying we have the answer for it. It's not saying we need to review the bill and have more witnesses. It's something that we want to bring to the attention of the minister and have him look at.

When we were finishing the clause-by-clause the other night, my colleague Glen read a list of briefs we got that he said were not taken into account, which was simply not true. Some of those I actually spoke to on the phone. I certainly read them. I hope others did. Some of the amendments we brought forward, but certainly these sections of this motion take into account what we heard from the emergency physicians; the Coalition for Gun Control; Alison Irons specifically was to do with a); the Canadian Federation of University Women; the nurses union; national shelters; and from Sunnybrook hospital, Dr. Sinyor. All of those fed into these.

Certainly the duty to warn is something we heard about. We have no ability to legislate that, but we think it's important for the minister to speak to his colleagues.

I'm hoping my colleagues will support this and not continue to play politics when it comes to domestic violence and suicide, because, I'll be honest with you, I'm just sick of it.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

We'll hear from Mr. Paul-Hus, Mr. Motz, Mr. Calkins, and Mr. Dubé.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, I must say to my colleague who is blaming us about a group of women victims that the Conservatives were the ones who always who supported the victims. All of the laws we adopted over the 10 years we were in power were always stricter toward criminals and aimed to help the victims. So please don't make any comments to me about assistance for victims. I think the Conservatives have a good record on this.

Bill C-75 includes criminal sanctions for persons who derive material advantage from the provision of sexual services, such as through forced marriage, polygamy, and the marriage of those of less than 16 years of age. From now on, these cases will be dealt with in the criminal justice system.

I'd like to go back to my colleague's notice of motion. I want to say to the committee that the content of that motion could have been dealt with when we studied Bill C-71; it could very well have been a part of it. These are elements we agree on. We agree on everything concerning background checks and having better investigations and better processes. Once again, this could all have been settled when we studied Bill C-71.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Mr. Motz, go ahead.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

Chair, as I have said, this is an ineffective bill to do what we thought this was supposed to do which is to protect public safety. These motions now, in my opinion, are nothing more than the government trying to cover their backsides for passing useless legislation.

These things could have easily been covered off in this bill. As my colleague just said, it was the previous Conservative government that saw fit to deal with domestic partner violence, intimate partner violence and firearms, to make sure those individuals did not...either lost them, that had an order from the courts to be lost and never got them back. That didn't happen before, so to suggest that we, on this side, are ignoring that element, that victimization, is completely erroneous.

I am troubled that we had an incredible opportunity to work together on dealing with public safety issues in Bill C-71. What happened? Nothing happened. We targeted a group of individuals who the evidence has shown repeatedly is one-third less likely than the general population to even commit a crime, but we're targeting them exclusively in this bill. We don't do anything for anybody else. Now to throw out all these other motions and recommendations....

Since they were put on the floor on Tuesday, the comments I've got back from the public that interacts with me are that the bill is useless. I'm hearing, “Where were you guys when this was debated? Why didn't we get a chance to come and debate this? Why didn't we get a chance to come and testify? What was the rush to try to get this through? What was the big panic? If there's actually more than lip service to this, why didn't we get a chance to testify?”

I think it's evident. The fact that we are now going to start looking at these things—and we could have at the front end of this—tells me there's some admission on the other side that this bill is useless. It doesn't do what it's intended to do, and that's increase public safety and deal with the illegal firearms used by gangs and gang violence.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

In light of the three interventions, I encourage colleagues to stay with the motion itself that's before us.

Mr. Calkins.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm a little bit worried. I understand there's basically a bit of a twist on the duty to warn. Currently medical practitioners are required in certain instances to inform the police when they fear for the safety of a child or something of that nature. This is broadening that duty to warn. I think we wouldn't necessarily have too many objections to this.

My concern is the threshold with the word “likely”, and I would like to ask my colleagues if they would amend their motion to have something that is a little higher bar than “likely”. I would like a little bit more certainty on that.

I'm a little bit concerned on two fronts because, if the government does adopt and go ahead with the terminology here and uses the terminology that's in this motion, I don't want anybody to ever fear about going to the doctor to get help they would otherwise need out of fear that their confidentiality and trust with the medical community might be in jeopardy. I think we would be doing a better service if we made sure we had the bar in the right place.

On paragraph c) in the English version, is it supposed to be “date” or “data”?

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

It's “data”.