Mr. Speaker, the premier of Ontario has directed the province's chief firearms officer, whom he appointed, to undertake home inspections of firearms owners, effective immediately. The current targeted group of owners of firearms are seniors who are in lawful possession of more than 10 firearms. He is violating the constitutional rights of our seniors by conducting, without warrants, searches of their private properties on the basis of age.
It is recognized that our courts are having a difficult enough time keeping up with real crimes such as murder, rape, assault and other violent offences without persecuting law-abiding senior citizens in a seriously misguided attempt to crack down on gun crime by inferring blame for older hunters. Therefore, the petitioners are calling on Parliament to put an immediate halt to all inspections without a court authorized search warrant by the province of Ontario until such time as these inspections are scrutinized under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, including those sections that protect Canadian citizens from unwarranted and unreasonable search and seizure.