Public Safety committee  That's something I would have to take away for some additional follow-up.

Public Safety committee  Thank you for your question. Mr. Duheme, did you want to talk about the border?

Public Safety committee  Thank you, Mr. MacGregor. Unfortunately, I haven't done that type of research. I think that question may be more for policy individuals in government who may have done that research, but I am aware of the New Zealand example. Obviously, the geography of New Zealand is very different from Canada's, so I wouldn't be in a position to transition what happened there to Canada's environment.

Public Safety committee  I am not aware to what extent they have done that research, but that could be a place to check.

Public Safety committee  Mr. MacGregor, you've got 10 seconds to spend.

Public Safety committee  Go ahead, Mike.

Public Safety committee  I would just add to that, Mr. McKinnon. A key issue with regard to domestic firearms being diverted into the illicit firearms market that I mentioned earlier is straw purchasing. We have been seeing this for a while, and it is continuing— someone with a legitimate firearms licence going out and purchasing multiple firearms legitimately, unregistered, and selling those into the illicit firearms market.

Public Safety committee  It is, but there's always more work to do with regard to continuing to encourage all police services to share as much intelligence as they can, whether it's with regard to organized crime, firearms, or other illicit activities. We need everybody to be sharing in a very robust manner.

Public Safety committee  I'll start off. I think it's always been going on. There have been increases and decreases over the years. It is reflective of a number of things in terms of gangs. For example, there are recruitment efforts and more relationships and liaisons that you have between street gangs and organized crime groups, especially in the urban areas, as that's where more street gangs tend to evolve, and there's competition between each other, so it depends on the drug markets in those areas as well.

Public Safety committee  Go ahead, Mike.

Public Safety committee  Thanks, Mike, for that. You just look at the landscape for organized crime, and I would invite everyone to look at it. Last week, we released a public report on organized crime in Canada. The purpose of the report is to help raise public awareness of organized crime groups operating in Canada and really give us, law enforcement and the government, that perspective.

Public Safety committee  Both.

Public Safety committee  It's the nature of the activity if they're both involved, and whether there are gangs or higher levels of organized crime. That's what leads to the use of firearms and the need to acquire illegal handguns or illegal firearms.

Public Safety committee  That's an excellent question. The answer would be that it's critical. The more intelligence and the better intelligence we can share between law enforcement agencies right across the country, the better understanding we'll have of the criminal landscape and the more insights we'll have of how we counter that.

Public Safety committee  Obviously, there's more work from tracing it back because it was an unregistered firearm. With the serial number, we can trace some of it back. The big piece here would be working with the police agency to determine the circumstances of the criminal investigation that resulted in the seizure of that firearm and whether that firearm was registered as being lost or stolen at some point in the past.