$42M SPENT ON PROGRAM THAT DOESN'T YET EXIST

Tory senator says project will be `boondoggle'

• Four years after the Trudeau Liberals announced sweeping changes to Canada's gun laws, the government has so far spent $42 million on a federal firearms confiscation program that doesn't yet exist.

In a response to an order paper question filed by Sen. Don Plett in September, Public Safety Canada revealed that $41,904,556 has been spent so far on the government's “firearms buyback program,” and that 60 department employees are working on the project.

“This is a boondoggle, and it hasn't even begun,” Plett said Friday during the Senate question period, directing his question at government representative Sen. Marc Gold.

“How can your government have spent $42 million on this, when not a single firearm has been bought back?”

As well, the documents reveal that IBM has been awarded a $2.27-million contract to develop, design and implement the program.

That figure is nearly double what that contract was worth when Public Safety Canada announced the firm's involvement in the program in 2020.

In the documents, the RCMP say it is managing a team of 15 full-time employees devoted to the program.

As well, Service Canada has assigned two employees to the program, and a response from Public Services and Procurement Canada said it has devoted “the equivalent of 5.825 full-time employees” to the project.

Last April, the federal government commenced the first phase of the program by entering into a $700,000 agreement with the Canadian Sporting Arms and Ammunition Association to confiscate so-called “assault rifles” from retailers.