Mr. Speaker, while I appreciate the member's comments, there is a number of areas with which I have grave concerns. The first is the distinction that this would somehow criminalize individuals. When we ask everyone to licence their car or their pet, we do not say that we are making criminals of them because we are asking them to do that.
She asserted that somehow long guns were not part of the problem. Maybe she can reflect on some of these statistics and tell me how she came to that conclusion.
Of the 15 police officers who were killed in the last decade, 13 of them were killed with long guns, not with handguns. Only two were killed by handguns. With respect to spousal homicides involving firearms, they are more than twice as likely to occur with a long gun than with a handgun. When I was on the Durham Region Police Services Board, it was made very clear to me that these were not individuals who had committed previous crimes. This is one of the things I am not sure the members appreciate. These are passion crimes. These are individuals who have these guns in their homes. The police who must respond to domestic violence cases need to know that those weapons are there.
Why would we remove something that is used over 9,000 times a day, that the police and chiefs of police say that we need and something that is a vital tool in stopping this type of thing?