Mr. Speaker, if we are to believe what we are reading we will spend another $133 million on top of whatever has been spent before a single firearm is registered.
If we look at the process to register a firearm or simply to get a licence to hold one, it is the same process or almost identical to the requirement for an FAC. The Toronto police board estimated the cost to process a single FAC requirement in 1994. I think it came to $181 to do that.
If Ontario is high and we knock it down to $100 and if there are three to six million firearm owners and we have to spend $100 to process a licence application, we will spend $300 million to $600 million before we register a single firearm. The cost has never been honestly declared by the government, either because it does not know it or it does not want us to know it.
The former minister of justice is on record as saying that if it came anywhere near half a billion dollars he would withdraw and not proceed. The government is hiding the cost and I dare say for that very reason.