Madam Speaker, I beg your indulgence for a couple of moments as I raise this issue.
The RCMP has been responsible for the registration of firearms since 1934. On April 12 a briefing note to the Minister of Justice stated:
RCMP operations in Ottawa, which houses the office of the Registrar, has about 400 employees--
This is the issue. Yesterday I learned that on July 1, 2001, the responsibility for the registration of firearms had been transferred from the RCMP to the Department of Justice without the knowledge or consent of parliament. When was the government going to tell us about this major change in the delivery of the Canadian firearms registry?
When Bill C-68 was going through parliament in 1995, everyone was led to believe that the RCMP, with more than 60 years experience in running a gun registry, would continue to be in charge of the registration component of the government's firearms program. Everything in the RCMP registrar's annual reports on firearms to the solicitor general, including the most recent report tabled in the House on September 17, also has indicated it was business as usual.
I recently learned that the RCMP registrar has a new office in the Department of Justice. I am not certain if the government has the legislative authority to make this major change without the knowledge or approval of the House. I respectfully request that you, Madam Speaker, examine this point or refer it to the Speaker.
For, if the authority that parliament granted the RCMP commissioner and his registrar in the Firearms Act has been usurped in this surreptitious move, then I ask the Speaker, would this be a breach of the Firearms Act and would I do better to deal with this by raising a question of privilege? That is my question for the Speaker.
Within this context, I also have learned that at the request of the Department of Justice the force has advanced some $25 million to cover the operating costs of--