Gun registry's looming demise welcome: shop owner
Last Updated: Friday, November 6, 2009 | 6:51 AM AT
CBC News
New Brunswick's largest gun shop owner is shedding no tears over the passage of a federal private member's bill that is designed to kill Canada's long-gun registry.
Ross Faulkner, the owner of the McAdam, N.B.-based Gun Dealer, sells more than 9,000 firearms annually.
That means Faulkner is required to enter data in a book and again online in the federal registry each time he sells a weapon. This task creates hours of work each day, especially in hunting season when he said he can sell 40 rifles or shotguns a day.
Faulkner said he is relieved to hear the registry could soon be shut down.
"I think common sense has prevailed. The objective to eliminate crime in Canada has not been met. It's been too costly," he said.
"I believe that the money that could be saved here would be better used by putting police on the streets where we do have problems with crime."
Faulkner said he does not accept the position of Canada's police chiefs that they need the information collected by the Miramichi, N.B.-based registry.
"I cannot believe that they continue to say this. The information is already available at store level," he said.
"The police chiefs know there is a lot of inaccuracies in the system. It is not 100 per cent accurate."
In an annual report from Canada's firearms commissioner prepared by the RCMP, police said they used the registry more than 2.5 million times in 2007.
Liberals introduced gun registry
The Conservatives have long opposed the gun registry, brought in by a former Liberal government in response to the killing of 14 women at Montreal's L'École Polytéchnique in 1989.
Conservatives often argue the long-gun registry has been a billion-dollar boondoggle.
However, a 2006 study by the auditor general found that eliminating the long-gun portion of the registry would only save taxpayers about $3 million a year.
Manitoba Tory backbencher Candice Hoeppner's private member's bill to eliminate the long-gun registry still has a few parliamentary hurdles to overcome before people such as Faulkner can finally say goodbye to the gun registry.
The bill must go to a parliamentary committee for examination before heading back to the House of Commons and the Senate for votes.
With support from 18 Liberals and New Democrats, the private member's bill passed second reading 164-137.
Madawaska-Restigouche Liberal MP Jean-Claude D'Amours voted with the Conservatives in support of ending the gun registry.
Liberal MPs Dominic LeBlanc and Brian Murphy and NDP MP Yvon Godin voted against the bill, while the province's Tory MPs all endorsed the private member's bill.
If passed, Bill C-391 would scrap the decade-old registry and destroy existing data within the system on about seven million shotguns and rifles.
Rural opposition
Opposition against the gun registry was especially acute in rural areas of Canada.
In New Brunswick, several Liberal backbenchers have voted against the gun registry over the years, fearing a backlash in their ridings.
But not everyone is celebrating the loss of the gun registry.
Deborah Glazebrook, a St. Stephen resident, said the gun registry is needed to protect police officers entering homes where there are domestic disputes.
"They might be able to keep an eye on what's going on with different houses," she said.
"They could say, OK, this household has registration of four guns, this name keeps popping up."
She said she hopes MPs think twice about scrapping it before their final vote.
