Mr. Speaker, there were a lot of non sequiturs in that premise and I do not accept them. I quite honestly do accept that there is a divide on this issue. I think we should respect that there is a divide on it. In a minority situation, this is not a bill that this Parliament should be dealing with.
This is a situation where every gun starts out as a legal gun. Every person starts out as a non-criminal. The bottom line is that we do have evidence showing that there are now more than two million gun owners and 90% of those guns are now licensed. There are over seven million firearms and 90% are registered. That leaves some unlicensed and unregistered weapons, and we know that.
Amnesties by our former government were trying to encourage that. We did amnesties in a way that was respectful of the process. We did not use an amnesty to kill a registry.
We have an act of Parliament. In 1995, this body respectfully put through a piece of legislation and it was put into effect. We have to take out an act of Parliament with an act of Parliament. For a year now we have had this piece of legislation and this is the first time it has been debated in this chamber. That was because commentators in the media were going after the government.
We know that the statistics in all areas are down. The rate of firearm thefts is the lowest in 30 years. Five hundred fewer people are killed per year than in 1991. The firearm homicide rate is down by 29%, even though the homicide rate without guns is down only 23%. The rate of homicides with rifles and shotguns, and the rate of women murdered with guns has plummeted both in 1991 and 1995. We strengthened controls on rifles and shotguns.
I would like to advise the member that the Quebec provincial government is trying to strengthen its controls. Why are we sitting here doing the opposite?