Mr. Speaker, the hon. member opposite seems to believe that the Minister of Justice is ignoring the recommendations of the privacy commissioner. In September 1999 the Department of Justice received an invitation from the privacy commissioner to do an informal inquiry into both what was right and what was wrong with the firearms program from a Privacy Act compliance point of view. The object of the inquiry was to fix any outstanding issues, if any. The Department of Justice accepted the commissioner's suggestion.
The annual report from the privacy commissioner discloses that in January 2000 he began a review of the firearms registry to thoroughly assess its personal information handling practices. He notes in his report that the deputy minister of justice has welcomed the review and awaits any observations and recommendations that would help the Canadian Firearms Centre meet its requirements under the Privacy Act.
The Canadian Firearms Centre examined that report in detail and had a meeting with the privacy commissioner's office in December 2000. In January 2001 the Canadian Firearms Centre submitted a report in writing expressing a number of improvements that could be made to the draft report. As of early March no response to the firearm centre's comments and request for examples of misuse of information had been received from the privacy commissioner. These are clearly not the actions of a minister, a department or a program that, in the words of the hon. member, continues to ignore the recommendations of the privacy commissioner.
I would like to address the member's second concern, that information used to make public safety decisions when deciding on eligibility for a firearms licence exceeds the authority of the minister and the Firearms Act. The House passed Bill C-68 after a lengthy debate. Section 5 of the Firearms Act specifies that a person is not eligible to hold a firearms licence if it is desirable in the interest of the safety of that person or any other person that the applicant not possess a firearm described in the statute.
To set the framework for making this determination, the legislated statute makes specific references to offences under the criminal code, such as an offence where violence is used, threatened or attempted, and offences respecting criminal harassment. Offences respecting drugs are specifically mentioned. Persons who have been treated for a mental illness are specifically mentioned where violence, threatened, attempted or used, is a concern. Finally, a history of behaviour that includes violence, threatened or attempted, against any person is specifically mentioned. Evidence of these factors could render an applicant ineligible for a firearms licence.
Gathering information in respect of these criteria is central to the public safety. The requirement of section 5—