Public Safety Committee on May 10th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

It's what you just said. It's the last part.

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

Subamendments don't matter. We can have 10 of them and it's five minutes, no matter what.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

I inquired about this very question with our—I don't what to call you “guys”; table officers, I guess—and that was their interpretation, which I agree with as well.

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

All right. Let me get into some of the questions I have with respect to this.

About the subamendment, Mr. Julian has accepted it as a friendly amendment. Is that correct?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

It has been moved as a subamendment. There is no friendly amendment.

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

Okay.

My question is twofold for our guests who are here.

Moving on to the subamendment, a “protection order” is an “order made by a Court”, first of all, “in the interest of the safety and security of a person”. I'll get into the conditions of release on that.

Why is this limited to just a court, which is actually in the protection order in the original motion? It says “made by any court”. There are provisions in some circumstances with domestic violence that an officer in charge can also release under these circumstances. We're limiting these sorts of conditions to only a court.

I'm curious to know why that is, or if I've missed something with this particular protection order, and what it means in this clause.

[Rachel Mainville-Dale]

Thank you for the question.

The intent of the clause as it was originally prepared was to define this in regulations. The first amendment proposed to define “protection order” through the bill, rather than in regulations, and was proposing the court. The subamendment then proposes to not limit it to a specific list, but again, yes, to the court.

Maybe I'll turn it to my colleague, Mr. Giammaria.

[Sandro Giammaria]

I can't speak to why the amendment reads as it does. I can say there are decision-making bodies empowered to issue orders that are not courts. The code will reflect this in certain instances.

There was an allusion to provincial legislation. There are various pieces of provincial legislation that will provide for some of the orders that would fit the description as in these enumerated paragraphs. I note that at the end of proposed paragraph (e), it says “or”, meaning that an order that does any one of these things would fall within the meaning of this definition.

Again, I can't say why, but I can say the effect of the word “court” would be to exclude those issuing bodies that are not courts.

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

Yes, my point being that if we're actually trying to provide additional supports and codify something that apparently.... I find the comments from Ms. Damoff interesting, because there is the ability federally, not just provincially, to do these exact same things that have existed for significant periods of time.

I'm very concerned that we are limiting this to just a court. Mr. Julian needs to determine whether he accepts this subamendment or not, but my concern is that it limits the ability of a victim, where an accused could fall into this sort of a situation where a court does not release him.... If what I heard the officials say before, you're trying to put this into the act itself that allows for these types of conditions to be used. These conditions are not new. These conditions have been used for decades on protection of people. All of them have—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Mr. Motz, I'm going to have to cut you off there.

Mr. Julian, go ahead.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

I would like to move that we renew for up to another 20 minutes, which would give another five minutes to Mr. Motz.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Add another five minutes for everybody?

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Yes. I'm not going to take mine, of course.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

You could.

Do we have unanimous consent to do this?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Very well, I see no one who is opposed.

We will carry on for another 20 minutes.

That means you have another five minutes.

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

Thank you, Chair.

The reason I'm bringing this up is that this is a critical component to the safety of those who are experiencing domestic violence specifically. I think that's the intent behind this. If that's the case, we should not limit the legislation to say only a court can impose this, right? The government has made this as a subamendment. They may want to consider making some changes to it.

Now, I've said my piece about that. What I want to go on to is, can the officials explain to me again why this is in the act when the forms that these people have been released on for many other things in the Criminal Code list a number of conditions you can place on an accused, including these.

I think somebody did explain previously, but I didn't get all of it. Why is this again being put into the act, as opposed to having the Criminal Code deal with the release conditions?

[Rachel Mainville-Dale]

This definition relates to other parts of amendments to the Firearms Act that are in Bill C-21 and that would expand licence revocation for certain situations. Where somebody becomes subject to a protection order, it would automatically revoke the licence rather than making it a condition of, for example, when you were talking about release and peace bonds and whatnot.

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

I'm sorry. I don't know if that answered my question. Why is this protection order definition in this act when you already can get protection orders in the code? Just help me understand that.

[Rachel Mainville-Dale]

It has to do with the automatic revocation of licences. The original proposal as it was in Bill C-21 was to define which protection orders, because not all of them.... Some of these, as my colleague was speaking of, are outside the Criminal Code and in provincial courts. It was to look at what protection orders were the ones that were related to domestic violence, intimate partner violence and gender-based violence in which an automatic revocation of a firearms licence would apply. That's therefore why it's necessary in the Firearms Act: to go along with the revocation provisions that are in the bill.

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

If that's the case, then I'm still confused. You mentioned the revocation of a possession licence or acquisition licence. I'm curious to know why we would still need this in the act. I don't get it.

[Rachel Mainville-Dale]

In terms of licence revocations, there are also other provisions in terms of licence revocations and refusals to grant a licence. There are numerous provisions in the bill having to do with licences in cases of protection orders. That's why it was necessary to define it in the Firearms Act, in order to give effect and limit, and to give context as to which protection orders would affect those licence provisions in the Firearms Act.

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

Could that not have been accomplished by adding a paragraph (g), for example, that, as one of the conditions, the licence is revoked until the matter is disposed of in court? Could that not apply the same way?

There are any conditions that you could have. I know from my experience that you can take a firearm licence away from an individual—suspend it, if you will—with the CFO from a province, but the police can do that immediately on a file. You wouldn't need to do this.

I'm really failing to see the need to codify this in the act when the Criminal Code already allows you to—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

You have 15 seconds.

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

Okay.

Again, maybe I'm not catching you. Maybe it's the time of night. Maybe it's because the Leafs are winning.