Bill aims to resolve gun registry dispute
OTTAWA The Liberals are aiming to resolve a constitutional challenge over a retroactive Conservative law that ended a probe into RCMP destruction of gun registry records.
Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale says the government is poised to introduce a bill to satisfy concerns raised by information commissioner Suzanne Legault.
The longrunning saga began in 2012 when Bill Clennett — best known for his 1996 confrontation with thenprime minister Jean Chretien — filed an Access to Information request for long-gun registry data, days before a Conservative bill ending the registry was to take effect.
Legault would later allege the RCMP knowingly destroyed registry records in violation of the access law.
The former Harper government cleared the Mounties and effectively quashed an investigation into their activities by the Ontario Provincial Police by passing a retroactive law just before Parliament was dissolved in 2015.
The omnibus budget bill exempted any “request, complaint, investigation, application, judicial review, appeal or other proceeding under the Access to Information Act or the Privacy Act” related to the old long-gun registry records.
It also backdated the law by almost four years to October 2011 when the Conservative legislation to end the registry was first introduced in Parliament.
Legault pursued a constitutional challenge on behalf of Clennett, a case that has effectively been in limbo for more than a year.
Legault said Thursday during a news conference to discuss her annual report that she hopes the coming Liberal bill “will actually lead towards resolution of that litigation.”
Goodale said he couldn’t talk about the content of the legislation before it is tabled, but he added: “We’re anxious to satisfy the expectations of the information commissioner and we’ve been working toward that end.”