National Post (National Edition)
WHY PROPOSED CHANGES WILL PUSH LEGAL GUN OWNERS UNDERGROUND.
The federal government's new gun-control legislation, Bill C-21, which was introduced in the House of Commons on Tuesday, has been roundly criticized for lacking any real teeth and targeting legal firearm owners, instead of organized crime and the underground weapons trade, which are the real sources of gun violence in Canada. While all this is true, it will also provide a further disincentive for otherwise law-abiding Canadians to purchase guns through legal channels.
Although Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said that, “There is nothing in the measures that we are bringing forward intended to interfere, or make more difficult, the activities of legitimate hunting and sport activities with firearms,” they will increase the uncertainty and risk faced by legal gun owners.
In response to the mass shooting in Nova Scotia last spring, the Liberals announced in May that they were “banning” 1,500 different models of previously legal guns, despite the fact that the shooter was using illegal weapons and the ban wouldn't have made a lick of difference if it had been in place beforehand.
Those who already owned those guns were allowed to keep them, but this new bill will place additional restrictions on them, including prohibitions on firing, transporting, selling and transferring them after the owner has died. Which isn't much better than an outright ban.
And Bill C-21 introduces further risks for lawful gun owners. If passed, it could allow police to conduct warrantless searches of private residences and seize firearms for up to 30 days, if a complaint is filed against the owner. This would completely negate the suspect's due process rights, as it would make it easier for police to conduct searches and confiscate private property without giving individuals the chance to defend themselves in court.
It would also give municipalities the power to effectively outlaw handguns within their borders by allowing them to pass bylaws that make it unlawful to transport pistols or store them anywhere except a licensed gun range.
There are not too many other items that can be acquired through perfectly legal means, but which have a very real chance of being made illegal, or having so many restrictions placed on their use that they become effectively outlawed, at any time. And unlike most other products, the government keeps meticulous records on every Canadian who owns a gun. If some future government ever wanted to confiscate them, it would know exactly whose doors to bust down.
If you wanted to install a wood-burning fireplace but thought city hall might ban them in the near future, as Montreal did in 2015, would you file a building permit and make sure all the paperwork was in order? Not likely. You'd probably find a contractor who you could pay under the table.
It would be disingenuous to suggest that those who are looking to acquire a firearm in the future would not make a similar calculation. A while back, in pre-pandemic times, some friends asked me if I wanted to take the firearms safety course with them so we could get our licences. My answer was a resounding “no.”
It's not that I don't like guns. I went to a shooting range in Texas last year and had a ton of fun. I'm also a firm believer in the right to self-defence. But in Canada, wannabe gun owners have to jump through a plethora of hoops, including taking the safety course, filing an application that includes a passport-style photo and a $60-$80 registration fee, as well as submitting to criminal, background and reference checks. Even more paperwork is required if you want to actually own a restricted weapon.
All this information is logged in the Canadian Firearms Registry, meaning that if the government ever decides to further crack down on legal owners, or there is a shooting a few blocks away, you can expect police to come a-knocking. And all this just for the “privilege” of having the means to protect yourself, and your family, without relying on the good graces of the state.
Which sounds like a terrible proposition. I do not own a gun, and don't have an overwhelming desire to get one, but if I were to, I certainly wouldn't acquire it through legal means. And I suspect I'm not alone.
In 2018, the Toronto Police Service warned that in recent years, it had seen a sharp increase in confiscated firearms that came from domestic sources, rather than being smuggled across the border. In 2012, around three-quarters of illegal firearms were imported from the United States, according to police, but by 2017, that number was down to 50 per cent.
Some of them have come from legal gun owners who sold them illegally, but police have also found weapons that have been built right here in Canada using unregulated parts, as well as those that have been manufactured or modified using 3D printers. Winnipeg police say they have also seen a sharp increase in homemade guns recently.
It's possible that only crooks and gangsters are purchasing these weapons, but I wouldn't be surprised if the buyers also included those who have no intent of using them for criminal activities but also don't want to deal with all the bureaucracy that's needed to buy them legally, or have an aversion to being listed in an RCMP database.
While some may have trouble finding illegal arms, I doubt it's all that hard: I've had friends tell me they can acquire illegal guns, and they can almost certainly be found on the dark web if one looks hard enough.
Bill C-21 will only serve to provide an additional incentive for those who think the legal system is more trouble than it's worth, to purchase on the black market, which is completely counter-intuitive from a gun-control perspective.