Projet Montréal program ‘ambitious’

Federal judge denies request by firearms advocates

Richard Bergeron’s party kicked off its election campaign during a spirited gathering in Old Montreal where the leader said he would release a platform in the coming days that will include ambitious projects, including the creation of a downtown tramway line, with a focus on sustainable development.

There was a glimmer of hope for those fighting to preserve Quebec’s long-gun registry data Wednesday after a federal judge set aside a request to have it destroyed.

The data are central to a case Quebec will argue before the Supreme Court and it would be inappropriate to dispose of what amounts to critical evidence, according to Justice Sean Harrington.

The federal government abolished the long-gun registry in April 2012 after years of claiming that the program was expensive, ineffective and intruded on the rights of rifle owners.

But Quebec vowed to preserve the long-gun data collected throughout the province to create its own registry

hat’s when a group of firearms advocates, including the National Firearms Association (NFA) and a Quebec gun dealer, filed a motion to have the information in Quebec destroyed as it had been in every other Canadian province and territory.

Quebec’s court of appeals ruled in favour of the advocates’ motion but the provincial government appealed the decision and awaits a federal hearing on the matter. Quebec will argue that the federal government’s decision to scrap the registry is unconstitutional and a violation of provincial jurisdiction.

Harrington also objected to a request from the NFA that would make it impossible for Quebec to continue gathering information on long gun purchases and prevent police from accessing the records that already exist.

Should Quebec win its case, there would be a “gaping hole” in the registry if the province weren’t allowed to continue gathering data, Harrington wrote in his decision.

Adopted under the Chrétien Liberals, the long gun registry was initially projected to cost about $2 million per year. By the mid 2000s, the project’s cost ballooned to over $600 million.

Despite the highly publicized overruns, a survey by the Canadian Firearms Centre found that most general duty police officers found the registry to be a useful tool during potentially dangerous operations.