Madam Speaker, I would be very happy to do so. As a matter of fact, the government seems to be in a bit of a conundrum on this, because we have heard varying and conflicting testimony before the committee. The chief firearms officer has the ability right now to go to any store and look at the records. We know that most stores keep those records anyway.
However, the chief firearms officer, after Bill C-71 passes, will also have immediate access to all of the person-to-person transactions that have been made with that associated reference number. Therefore, if I sell my firearm to somebody else, or he or she sells one to me, that will be captured as well. With respect to the business-to-business transactions, if one business chooses to sell those firearms to another, all those records will also come under the purview of government. The government will have control of those records. Should the business shut down and not pass on those records through the sale of the business, all of those records would automatically go to the government to be part of that transaction database as well.
This is where we need some further clarification. As a matter of fact, the responsible thing for all members of this House to do would be to know the definitive answer to this question. When we heard from the witnesses before the committee, there seemed to be a lot of confusion about this. The warrantless access of the chief firearms officer and the warranted access that an investigating officer would need is a blurry line. I did not make this up. This was told to us by the representatives of the Canadian Association of Police Chiefs. We have to be doing our due diligence and making sure that the privacy of Canadians is protected, and that their rights are not being violated through unwarranted search and seizure.