Mr. Speaker, I have been watching this government since 2006, particularly concerning this issue. I simply cannot understand its position, because all experts agree on the relevance, value and importance of this registry. Furthermore, one of the experts called upon by this government even wrote a book entitled “How to Manipulate Public Opinion”. This just goes to show the kind of experts the government relies on.
That said, the Conservatives have still not implemented the regulation that would allow imported weapons to be registered and documented. The United States has similar regulations. In the U.S., when a foreign weapon enters the country, they know where it comes from, which company made it, what year it was made and so on. Canada has yet to implement that regulation, although it exists. Yes, this does facilitate weapons trafficking.
This government claims that it wants to fight weapons trafficking and violence in our streets, but at the end of the day, what is it doing? It is allowing weapons to circulate freely. Tomorrow morning, anyone can go and purchase a weapon, without registering it of course. Thus, the authorities will never know this person has a weapon, let alone how many. Imagine that. People can easily import weapons because, in any case, although the regulation on importing weapons exists, it has not been enforced. This government has been influenced by the firearms lobby—