Charlie Angus

[Ending the Long-Gun Registry Act, February 6th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I have such immense respect for you and I will certainly respect your sage advice as always.

Once again, the Conservatives are playing with the lives of people. Since 1991 deaths by homicide have dropped 65% and suicides by 41%. Those are verifiable facts but they have been making things up because they want to make it seem that this is an issue that has nothing to do with life and death. Canadians know it does because we are dealing with firearms.

[Ending the Long-Gun Registry Act, February 6th, 2012]

Since 1991 homicide deaths have dropped 65—

[Ending the Long-Gun Registry Act, February 6th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I have great respect for my hon. colleague, but being a comedian is not one of her greatest strengths so she should stick to her talking points. She is probably feeling a little touchy because she did come into my riding with the express job of having me lose my job and I certainly won by a large majority. I would like to thank her because the gun registry certainly helped with all those dumb little attack ads the Conservatives mailed into my riding with those really badly drawn pictures. If those guys are going to do attack ads, they have to hire some credible people.

The question is about suicide and homicide deaths. They have been lying in this House all day.

[Ending the Long-Gun Registry Act, February 6th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud to rise and represent my region on an issue that is this important.

Just this past year, Canada shocked the international community at the arms negotiation treaty on small arms. The small arms treaty is vitally important. Every year 740,000 people are murdered in narco-states and places like the Congo, in areas where there is tribal violence, civil war, gang violence, deaths that are caused by weapons that are easily smuggled into these countries.

My hon. colleagues on the other side have this myth about shotguns. A shotgun is like something that is in the painting of Whistler's Mother, or American Gothic, that it is just a tool, but a shotgun does kill and a shotgun in the hands of a narco-gang is certainly a very effective tool.

When individuals are looking at holding families hostage if they have lost their job, a shotgun is a very serious thing. In the past I have heard it said by some people on the other side that to say, “guns kill people” is the same as saying that pencils cause mistakes. However, when we are dealing with the 740,000 deaths happening internationally because of the small arms trade, certainly people are not going into the Congo with pencils; they are going in there with Mausers, double-barrelled shotguns and whatever they can.

I raise this to explain the back story of where the Conservatives are going with this. Canada had been an international leader in trying to stem the trade in small arms weaponry. Yet when the Conservatives went to the last round of negotiations, they did what they had been doing on all the international treaties. They said that the treaty was too ambitious. They said it was “seeking too much”, that it was too detailed. Then they dropped the other shoe. They wanted an exclusion of all sports and recreational weapons from the small arms treaty.

If we look at the mass killings around the world, they are not just done with AK-47s. If we consider what is a sports or recreational gun, for example, the École Polytechnique weapon, that is a pretty effective weapon if it is in the hands of a drug lord. Canada said at this treaty that it would not sign off on an international agreement unless it excluded all these guns.

Who did the Conservatives take with them as their special expert? They took the Canadian Sport Shooting Association, which is the right hand of the National Rifle Association in Canada.

We see the willingness of the Conservatives to undermine an international treaty that protects people in places like the Congo and Colombia for gun ideology.

We have looked at this gun registry bill. With the another bill, the member for Yorkton—Melville wanted to get rid of the provisions that would make it possible for police to stop gang-bangers who were carrying restricted weapons in cars.

Whenever the Conservatives talk about duck hunters and farmers, they are always using them as straw men to move something else. This time they have moved the clauses in the bill that deal with the fundamental effects of licensing. Because of the trade of weapons, it is important to be able to verify whether someone should actually have a gun. That is an issue of public safety.

In the clauses dealing with the transfer of non-restricted firearms, the verification process is now voluntary. We do not actually have to check. If we do check, and this is the real kicker, the registry is not allowed to keep a record if someone verifies whether someone has a right to have a gun.

I know people back home who have had their guns taken away because they were not mentally balanced enough. However, they could go to their cousins, walk out with guns and they could say they bought them, although they did not have the papers. When asked if they checked, they could say that they phoned the registry, but the registry could not verify it.

What the Conservatives are obviously creating, and it is not an accident, it is the intent of the bill, is a whole black market in the transfer of guns. If there is no ability to check whether people actually made verifications, they can do whatever they want. Lost or stolen guns do not have to be reported, only if they are restricted.

This is also a free pass for the criminals. As it stands now, in northern Ontario when the OPP does a big bust and all kinds of weapons are seized, the guys who are caught with their grow ops and their 25 guns always say they are gun owners, that they own the guns. My hon. colleague would know what this is all about. They can say they own the guns. When asked for their records of purchase they claim to have lost them. Under the registry right now it is pretty straightforward to find out whether or not they actually own those guns. It is not all that difficult.

The government is going to erase that provision. This is the get out of jail free clause for gun criminals that the government is bringing in. Someone can trade the École Polytechnique gun, or the Dawson shooter's gun and not worry whether they will be double-checked because it will be impossible to check.

I have been hearing a lot of bizarre comments from my colleagues this morning about verifiable data. I have a lot of friends who are in the police force back home. When we go out we talk about their issues. I always ask them about the registry and if they really use it. They tell me they use it every day. They say it is not enough to know that someone is a gun owner. If there is a domestic violence issue and they see the escalating factors of domestic violence to the point that they have to go into a home, they need to know if there are four or five guns in the house. That fifth gun is the difference between life and death.

It is the same issue with suicides. That party over there says there is no evidence whatsoever on suicide deaths. I have seen the suicide deaths in northern Ontario from long guns. It is essential when there is a concern that the police and family members have raised that they know if the person has four or five guns. It is not enough to know the person is a gun owner.

The reality I hear from police officers whom I speak with is diametrically opposed to the line that was taken by the Conservatives' public safety chair, the member for Yorkton--Melville, who wrote to me, figuring that we were going to be on the same side of the Conservatives' policy on guns. He said in his letter to me that we “risk becoming a state where police can dictate our personal freedoms. Why are the police so strident in their quest to keep the registry in place? They won't admit it, but it appears they don't want Canadians to own guns. To that end, they need a database that will help them locate and seize those firearms as soon as the registration expires.”

I am sorry, but that is the stuff of a conspiracy theory. That is not the basis of public policy. The member for Yorkton--Melville believes that the police want to know where guns are so they can come and seize them because they do not believe in the right of people to bear arms. That is the kind of misinformation that I think has created this false crisis.

I have dealt with the gun registry for 15 years. As a gun owner I filled out those first rotten forms that the Chrétien Liberals had brought in. It was a dumb process at the time. It was an onerous process. It was completely inefficient. I saw the growing backlash in rural Canada. I dealt with it as an elected official in 2004. We had numerous problems. The issues of criminalizing, if there was a problem with the registry, were the issues we were hearing. By 2006 I was not hearing those problems. The issues I have heard again and again have to do with licensing. People are concerned about possession and acquisition. These are things that can be dealt with.

What we are seeing here is that the Conservatives have opened the door on a whole manner of other issues. They are using rural Canadians as a front. What they are creating is a process that is going to lead to more deaths, more violence, and more impact on our front-line responders.

[Ending the Long-Gun Registry Act, February 6th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, what is very concerning is that every time the Conservatives come forward with one of these gun bills, they use the bill to try to get through a whole manner of other things. The last bill they had would have allowed gang-bangers in Vancouver to drive around with restricted weapons without being stopped.

Now we see from the change in the licensing requirements that there would be a whole illicit trade in guns, because one would not actually have to verify that someone has a proper licence. If one phones the registry to find out is someone has even done this, it will be clear that even the registry is not allowed to keep a record.

It seems to me what we are seeing is nudge, nudge, wink, wink to the gun lobby that once the law comes into effect, it will be open season and people will be able to trade guns however they want, and no one will have the legal protection to find out.

Why are the Conservatives making it impossible to keep record checks so we could find out whether people should be able to buy these guns?

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, this is another part of the demographic that we see across our country because we have different labour patterns. Northern Ontario and northeastern Ontario have boom-bust economies. I have seen that in many of my communities.

I remember when the Sherman mine, the Adams mine, all of the Agnico mines and the iron ore mines went down. A working population of men, who, on average, were about 48 or 49 years old, suddenly found there was no work for them. The mines offered them retraining. However, in a single mining town they did not have enough for their pensions. By the time the next boom came around, these men were a little too old to get hired. These men, who would normally have paid into pensions, ended up with their wives on old age security and GIS.

That is what happens because there is no such thing as absolute security in income. We see gaps where suddenly savings that are made one year are lost. When people lose their savings they start to look to age 65 as something to reach out to and hold on to because when they hit 65 they will be okay. The government is now saying that it will put that bar just a bit further.

If someone is a friend of the government or the type who can afford a $1,300 limo ride, like my good friend the minister from Durham, then he or she will be okay and will get through. However, for everybody else it is “too bad, Jack”.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud to rise in the House, as I always am, to represent the people of Timmins—James Bay on an issue that I think is fundamentally at the heart of what we are about as parliamentarians.

The fact is that we are here to debate a motion that had to be brought forward because of the Prime Minister's cavalier attitude toward the working people of this country, the senior citizens in this country.

We have almost grown used to the attitude of the Prime Minister, who shows regular contempt for the House of Commons, shutting down debate, ordering secret meetings, but I think people across Canada were somewhat shocked that the Prime Minister would talk to the millionaires in Davos and tell them that our senior citizens are living high off the hog and that we had to get this thing in order.

This is a government that had a $13 billion surplus and ran it into the ground before the deficit even started. Under the Prime Minister, government spending on ministerial offices has gone through the roof. The Conservatives have made the poor old Liberals look like they were wearing sackcloth and ashes and were so careful after the way the Conservatives spend. That is some piece to get away with, and that was done under the Prime Minister. Blowing money is not a problem with the Conservatives when it comes to blowing it on boats, fighter jets and prisons.

The Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development yesterday told us she was worried about a foreign invasion. The Fenians have not come across the border out of Buffalo since 1863 or 1864. A few times the Boston Bruins have come over and caused some fights in Toronto, but there is no need for us to take that off the backs of senior citizens.

The Prime Minister decided to open this debate. I see my colleagues in the Conservative Party are feeling a little ruffled, and damn well they should be, because for the last week my phone has been ringing. Not just senior citizens have been phoning me, but people who are working, younger people, and people who know that what they are seeing from the government is an absolute sham and an absolute scam. They know there is no such thing for most working people as a private pension any more. Most of the people I know are working on contracts, going from contract to contract.

We hear the Conservatives wax on about the underutilized capacity of RRSPs as though if people were just a little sharper, a little smarter, they actually might save for their future, as opposed to the reality, which is that when people are raising a family, going from job to job while trying to put something away, when they fall in between contracts, that is their savings gone. It might be three months, four months, five months or a year. That is their savings gone. People need some form of security.

We have a few setups that were put in place and the most effective was the CPP. Some of the ideologues on the Conservative backbench have a real problem because it was a public system that was set up, but it works. It is low cost. It gives people something. It is effective. The problem is that the CPP has not kept up.

As the New Democrats have been saying, this is a system that works. Allow people to save more and then people will not have to rely on the guaranteed income supplement or the old age security if they have something to fall back on.

We see many people who tried to save RRSPs, and some of them have done very well. If a person is doing very well financially, RRSPs might be okay. However, I know many people in my riding who have lost 30% or 40% of the value of their savings since the 2008 crash. They are trying to find out from us what is happening with old age security.

It is not just that the Prime Minister decided to create a crisis for all the working people who are now in their thirties and forties wondering about what is coming, but it is the lack of vision for what is actually happening on the ground with senior citizens.

In Timmins—James Bay there are large regions of rural populations of senior citizens who are in old farmhouses whose kids have gone down south. They come into my office. They cannot afford to heat their places any more. They do not have enough money. I cannot tell them to move into town because there is no such thing as seniors' housing or long-term care. It is not available. Costs are being put on these families just to heat their houses, so whatever savings they have are eaten up.

This idea is right out of Charles Dickens: “They can work longer. Are there no workhouses? We can make them work until they are 67.”

There are people who can retire. They might not have everything they need to retire but at age 65 or 66 they can continue working doing some work. I know some senior citizens who like to work and it is good because they have incredible experience. However, there is a difference between choosing to work and being forced to work. When we are forced to work because we cannot make ends meet and we are 66 years old, then there is a whole other set of related issues that start to come in. We see larger health care costs. We see all kinds of stress on the family unit. Sometimes family members who have moved away need to move back to deal with their aging parents.

This is not a debate that one starts in Davos by launching a trial balloon or by saying something off the top of one's head. That is not what a responsible Prime Minister does. The Prime Minister had the whole election to talk about what the Conservatives' strategy was for pensions and we heard zip.

The Conservatives have come back and have created this unnecessary crisis. They are feeling very defensive today, we can sense it, because they do not want people paying attention to this. Just like yesterday, when they shut down the debate on the pooled registered pension plan, they do not really want this getting out because when they get back home, sit down with people and tell them that it is their future that is on the line, they will get a whole different response. I think this is something the government knows very well and is feeling a little touchy about.

I would say that if the Conservatives want to go on a tour, we can go on a tour together and visit some of these communities. Let us put their plans on the table and hear what people think, especially those who are 45 years old and who are getting by on a little bit RRSP here and a little RRSP there but who are unable to actually have savings. Let us hear what they have to say when they are told that they will be the sacrificial generation, that they will take it on so that the Prime Minister can tell his buddies in Davos, “You know that $6 billion we blew on Caterpillar in London, that was a good investment. But those seniors, we're getting them in line. Don't you worry”.

When I was a kid, my grandmother always told me that Tory times were hard times, and that is a fact. We have a government that comes from a miserly stock. The Conservatives are as miserly now as they were in my grandmother's day. When Canadians hear that the Conservatives decided to go to Davos and blame our senior citizens for the financial mess they are creating, I think they will have a fight on their hands. I think this is a fight that Canadians know that those guys will lose.

For those folks back home who are maybe a bit younger and have not been involved in pensions, this is about a very small amount of money. We are talking about $491 a month, which is the average monthly guaranteed income supplement. For the OAS, we are talking about $500 a month. My God, those ministers blow more on a lunch than what they are giving to a senior citizen, at $500 a month. Our famous minister from Durham spent $1,300 a day on taxi rides. She hired these limos and drove around Toronto at $1,300 a day. Boy, oh, boy. If she did that five times around the city of Toronto, that would be the OAS for a senior citizen for a year. However, the Prime Minister never said that he would make the member for Durham responsible. No. He decided that it would need to be a senior citizen who had to pay.

This is about priorities and the government has established that its priorities are for its friends, for its buddies and for its ministers who drive around in limousines and that the people who get $500 a month on OAS are just going to have to suck it up. That is not good enough.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I do not think it is relevant or fair to this debate that the member is trying to read in comments about what someone said earlier today. If she has a problem with what was said earlier today, she should have asked a question then. Her question should be on this speech. She should focus her issues on what she heard in this debate.

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, February 1st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I like that my hon. colleague has come up with the money under the mattress theory for savings. The reason CPP works is that the contributions come off people's cheques. They go in the CPP to be used later. That is why it works. If we had a voluntary CPP, there would be no pension plan and everybody would be scrambling.

The member wants the keep the money in their pockets plan. We have had that in the past. It is called money under the mattress or burying something in the back yard. However, if we are going to have a system that people can retire on, we need a system that works. If my colleague thinks that CPP does not work, then maybe the Prime Minister should go to Davos and tell the millionaires that.

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, February 1st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, our obligation is to represent the working people of this country and the people who need pensions.

The fact is that the government barely made any effort to deal with the provinces. If some provinces think that we will take a stinky deal over a good deal, that is not good enough. The fact is that debate has been shut down here after less than 24 hours.

My colleague might want to go home early, and that is fine for him. I am here to debate this bill. I am here to find out what works in this bill and what fails in this bill. There is no reason that I should be expected to stand up in this House and vote for a bill that has been given less than 24 hours of debate.

My colleague might think that it is great that we can get out in time for an early supper or drinks, but this is about our pensions. I am here to debate it. I am here to make sure this job is done right.