Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Frontenac—Mégantic for his important questions.
He has noted my involvement in the Canada-Ireland interparliamentary friendship group and I thank him for that commercial.
I will not belabour the point other than to simply say in the most serious way I can that if there is a country in the world perhaps where we can see the results of there being no control or very inadequate control over firearms and other dangerous weapons, I think that unfortunately the country of my ancestors is a very ready example of where the problem can lead to whatever the motivation is behind it.
The most relevant question my colleague asked was that the provinces of Quebec and Ontario have their own police forces whereas in other provinces those services are provided by the RCMP. That is quite true, but of course as we know, the other eight provinces contract for the services. They pay for the services by the RCMP.
La belle province du Quebec and the province of Ontario choose to have their own police forces. They would not have to have their own police forces if they did not choose to. They could apply for the same service to be contracted with the RCMP. I think it is a reflection of the size of the two provinces, Quebec and Ontario, that they wish to have their own police forces.
As for municipal forces, my friend again mentioned my involvement in municipal government. While I well know there is no requirement for my city of London, Ontario to have its own municipal force, it chooses to have it. The taxpayers of the city of London fund it and are prepared to do so on a priority basis. There are smaller communities near my riding such as the town of Exeter just to the north of London. A number of those communities are now saying that perhaps they cannot afford their own municipal force any more.
The decisions my colleague refers to really are choices in my view that the municipalities across Canada make, be they in Ontario or Quebec. In the example he cited, the choices of the provinces of Quebec and Ontario to have their own police forces are choices the people and their governments have made provincially.