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An Open Letter To The Canadian Police Association From The N.F.A. 24 June 2003
National Firearms Association
Box 52183
Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2T5
Phone: (780) 439-1394
www.nfa.ca
Open Letter to the Canadian Police Association: Setting the
record straight on firearms.Our Members keep telling us when they talk face to face to
frontline law enforcement officers they are told, by those
officers, that the federal government's gun control program
is a farce.When I talk with police officers, they tell me that this
legislation does not help them to do their job and that the
money spent on this legislation could have been spent in
far better ways - including the hiring of more officers and
the purchase of new equipment.At the Blueline Magazine Trade Show this past April, my
Vice President, Wally Butts and I spoke to over 700
frontline police officers - not one single officer had
anything good to say about the entire program.Yet to listen to David Griffin, the Canadian Police
Association's spokesperson, in the House of Commons
committee hearings, in the Senate committee hearings, or in
the media, his words seem to have been drafted in the
Minister of Justice's office. The voice of the Canadian
Police Association sounds more like a shill for the
government than the voice of Canadian Police Officers.
Not one of the promises made by this government to the
Canadian Police Association has been kept. Not one. Yet the
Canadian Police Association continues, apparently, to
blindly support this boondoggle.Worse yet, the Canadian Police Association has passed
resolutions on these matters -- and still has not been
addressed, as promised by the federal government.
1. In 1999, the CPA resolved, "that the Auditor General of
Canada conduct a thorough review of the firearms
registration system."Contrary to the CPA's demand, the Auditor General has not
conducted the review as demanded by the CPA!2. In 1999, the CPA resolved to have "the accuracy of
the information that is collected in the firearms
registration database" verified.The Registrar of Firearms has indicated that there is a 90%
error rate in the applications to register firearms. RCMP
and Surete du Quebec sources verify that there is a 50%
error rate in the Firearms Interest Police (FIP) database.
RCMP sources also verify that there is a 40% error rate in
the Firearms Reference Table (FRT) database. Treasury Board
documents verify that there is 50% error rate in firearms
licence applications. According to Department of Justice
research documents, the 67-year-old handgun registry has an
error rate of more than 50%. Rather than confirming the
accuracy of the information in the gun registry, the RCMP's
Registrar of Firearms has simply verified its inaccuracy.3. In 1999, the CPA resolved to have "confirmation
that the registration system has the capacity to meet the
legislative timeframes established for firearms
registration."The Department of Justice failed to meet the deadline to
licence the three million gun owners it estimated resided
in Canada. This failure left more than one million
responsible firearm owners and about three million firearms
out of the system forever. Furthermore, the Department has
not provided any credible evidence that they will have any
more success meeting the registration deadline.Today, we are mere days away from tens of thousands of
Canadians being criminalized as a direct result of this
government's 'head in the sand' attitude. There are
countless Canadians who have applied for, but are not
expected to receive them before Canada Day.Contrary to the CPA's demands, the Department of Justice
tried to meet the registration deadline of January 1, 2003
by compromising the accuracy of the information in the
registry! The Department of Justice scrapped the very idea
of "unique registration" and is now issuing meaningless,
untraceable certificates.4. In 1999, the CPA resolved to have government assurance
that "the cost recovery plan for the registration can be
achieved."In 1995, Justice Minister Allan Rock tabled the Financial
Framework for the gun registry and promised Parliament and
the public that the registry would run a deficit of only
$2.2 million over the first five years. On July 19, 1999,
The Toronto Star published a letter from Justice Minister
Anne McLellan that stated: "user fees will cover the entire
cost of the [gun registry] program."Contrary to the CPA's demand, taxpayers are on the hook for
this soon-to-be billion-dollar expenditure with recent
estimates of expenditures indicating a further one billion
over the next ten years. How much in the way of police
expansion and new police equipment will be scrapped in
favor of this failed gun control system?5. In 1999, the CPA resolved that "meaningful consultations
with the User Group to ensure that the concerns of
stakeholders are addressed in the review process."The recommendations of the Minister's User Group on
Firearms have, for the most part, been ignored since the
day the User Group was formed. It meets in secret, its
recommendations are secrets, and no one knows what, if any,
effect it has had.When Martin Cauchon was Minister of Justice, he did not met
with the User Group until he was embarrassed into doing so
by publicity generated by that failure.Solicitor General Easter decided not to make that same
mistake, he effectively disbanded the User Group and formed
what I firmly believe is a squad of cheerleaders
to "advise" him on the firearm issue. There is not one
single representative of any shooting organization on the
committee, nor anyone with expertise in firearms control
law.6. In 1999, the CPA resolved that they need "confirmation
that the implementation and operation of the system is not
taking officers off the street."As of the summer of 2000, there were about 1800 employees
working on the gun registry, not including the hundreds of
designated Firearms Officers in every province. Although,
the Minister of Justice has refused to release any
information to the Library of Parliament in respect of
these numbers, it is well known that many of the designated
Firearms Officers are police officers that have been taken
off of regular police duties.However, contrary to the CPA's demands, hundreds of person-
years and hundreds of millions of dollars have been
diverted from real law enforcement priorities!7. In 1999, the CPA resolved to have "The Auditor General
of Canada release a public report on their findings to the
people of Canada."When the Auditor General tried to do an audit of the
Firearm Registry, she had to suspend that audit - she
couldn't find out the information she needed. The records
were in such a mess that no audit could be done.Now, enough about broken promises.
What the National Firearms Association and the Canadian
Police Association should both be doing is working toward
safer streets, safer communities and a practical firearm
control system that severely punishes the criminal use of
weapons.A good first step on this will be for the Canadian Police
Association to conduct an independent survey of the members
of the Canadian Police Association.To my knowledge, this has never been done. If it has been
done, it certainly has not been made public. Such a survey
would be a good start to making sure that the Canadian
Police Association is representing the views of front line
law enforcement officers.The Saskatchewan Association of Police Officers set the
course for such a survey. In 1995, when Grant Obst was
President of that association, they did a survey of each
member of the association. 76 percent of the Members said
that they do not support Bill C-68.The National Firearms Association believes the results of
that survey will allow the Canadian Police Association to
responsibly drop its support of this failed firearm
registry.Then, working together, with stakeholders and government,
we can start the process of developing a firearm control
system that will make a real difference in increasing
public safety.I look forward to working with you on this.
Sincerely
James M. Hinter
National President
Encl.
This is an example of some of the comments our Members hear
from police officers about the Firearms Registry. This is
why the Canadian Police Association must hold a one member,
one vote survey and release the results publicly on this
failed registration program:RETIRED RCMP OFFICER JACQUES DRISDELLE: I am a retired RCMP
officer with 29 years of service . serving in Ontario, NWT,
Yukon and BC with 21 postings. I haven't been retired long
enough not to keep in touch with several friends in the
force. I always like to ask them what they think of the new
gun laws. They tell me what I also know, that the gun
registry does very little or nothing in reducing violent
crime. The smart officers do not rely on the gun registry
database when responding to a complaint, whether domestic
or other. If they rely on the information they receive,
they know they will place themselves in harms way, because
the information available is not reliable and never will
be. The great majority of street policeman knows that the
firearm registry is a complete waste of money and poorly
thought out. A person illegally and criminally using a
firearm is the problem, not the firearm. Bill C-68 is
attempting to deal with firearms related crime by
addressing firearms and not the real problem, "people" or
better yet, "criminals." Bill C-68 is but one step towards
complete confiscation of all firearms and contrary to
the "do-gooders", nothing about reducing crime. You or I
and millions of others who own firearms are not "criminals"
and would and will never use them for a criminal purpose.
Unfortunately this law has everything to do with anti-
firearms and the advocates behind the law than reality.
It's sad when anti-gun advocates can rule other innocent
people's lives.Source: Quote from an e-mail posted on the Canadian
Firearms Digest - January 29, 2003.The Promises:
Alan Rock: 'Should the decision be to proceed with a system
of registration, it will only be on the basis that such a
system can be established through a reasonable outlay of
capital costs.' - Nov. 14. 1994Alan Rock: 'We have provided our estimate of the cost of
implementing universal registration over the next five
years. We say that it will cost $85 million. .... We
encourage the members opposite to examine our estimates. We
are confident we will demonstrate the figures are realistic
and accurate." - Feb. 16, 1995The Reality: "I got crucified on gun registration," Mr.
Hec Clouthier, former Liberal MP. Mr. Clouthier was
defeated in the last election on the firearm legislation."A billion dollars spent on health care would have saved
countless lives. Instead we spent $1 billion on Allan
Rock's personal vendetta against firearms and got less than
nothing. Thanks, Allan." Doug MacKay, Canadian Taxpayer. 04
December 2002."We said from the beginning this program was regrettably
dead on arrival and wouldn't work," Manitoba Premier Gary
Doer. 04 December 2002."There were some mistakes, sure. We expected that the
provinces were going to help us, and in some places they
did not; they made it very difficult for us," Prime
Minister Jean Chretien. 04 December 2002."Expenditures of that size mean that money poured into the
gun registry cannot be spent on resources for, say, the
RCMP or other federal security agencies. Municipal police
services, too, must spend money on registering guns, rather
than fighting crime." Leader Post, Regina Saskatchewan.
Editorial 05 December 2002."It would appear that the federal gun control scheme's
days are numbered. The program is fifty times more
expensive than the government first suggested. Furthermore,
the value of the information in the expensive gun registry
is of dubious value, according to the RCMP itself." Moncton
Times and Transcript. Editorial 05 December 2002."Straight shooters they're not. But then, they never aimed
to be. For seven years, bureaucrats in Canada's justice
ministry under Allan Rock, Anne McLellan and now Martin
Cauchon have lowballed, denied, hidden and shrugged off the
ever-rising cost of setting up a national firearms
registry." Toronto Star Editorial 05 December 2002."But what we needed was a low-cost, effective program, not
a billion-dollar bureaucratic boondoggle that threatens to
make the cost overruns at the Caisse de Depot headquarters
in Montreal look like a bargain. And there's not even much
evidence the program is effective. The Justice Department
boasts that it has refused licenses to 30,000 ''dangerous
individuals,'' which sounds great until you read the RCMP's
report on the database used to make such judgments."
Montreal Gazette 05 December 2003.Now, let us listen to what Police Officers and Chiefs are
saying:"If people want guns, they're always going to be able to
get the guns and, unfortunately, those people are the ones
that get the guns for the wrong reasons. Not a lot we can
do about it, do the best we can, but I think it all boils
down to stiffer penalties, get the people off the street,
the guns go with them," said Dale Burn, Calgary Police
Service."Source: Quote from CFCNplus.ca - "Gun debate heats up in
Calgary" - Tuesday, February 18, 2003Ontario's police chiefs have branded Ottawa's controversial
gun registry program an "unenforceable" mess and are
warning that they will not charge people under the law
until problems are resolved. "It puts us in a position
where the law is unenforceable, so we're advising our
officers to use discretion and not issue offence notices
until this mess is sorted out," said Owen Sound police
Chief Tom Kaye yesterday. Kaye is president of the 66-
member Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police. "It
wouldn't be right to charge someone when we wouldn't have a
reasonable chance of getting a conviction," Kaye said. At a
meeting in Halton Hills this week, the executive of the
chiefs' association voted to send a letter suggesting the
federal government put the registry on hold until the
problems are resolved. "When the registry was first
proposed, the government came to us looking for support; if
we are going to maintain that level of support, we want
some answers about what's going on," Kaye said.Source: Quote from The Toronto Star - "Chiefs balk on gun
registry; Fix it, then we'll enforce it, say Ontario
police," Page A07, January 25, 2003Tom Stamatakis, president of the Vancouver Police Union,
told me: "I can't say if the registry has been helpful or
not. It has been such a long, drawn-out process of getting
the firearms registered. And there have been problems with
compliance." Stamatakis says police would get "more bang
for our money by investing in staffing, equipment, ways of
dealing with horrendous drug issues and marijuana grow ops
and availability of court time. I see lots of other areas
that could use the resources being committed to this
firearms registry."Source: Quote from The St. Catherines Standard - Column by
Barbara Yaffe, "Liberals defy calls to end gun registry:
Eight provinces and three territories want program to be
halted," Page A7, January 14, 2003
Grant Obst: "The Saskatchewan Federation of Police Officers
does not feel Bill C-68 focuses on the real problem. The
real problem is criminals, not further restrictions on law-
abiding citizens. Saskatchewan's' municipal police officers
see very little need for further gun restrictions. We are
of the opinion that C-68 does little to prevent crime, or
assist in the apprehension of criminals. When a
Saskatchewan police officer thinks of a gun, he/she usually
thinks of hunting - not homicide.
Saskatchewan police officers, like other Saskatchewan
residents do not have faith in Bill C-68. We know it is not
enforceable, and furthermore will have a great deal of
trouble adhering to a law those we serve do not approve of.
Saskatchewan police officers are not interested in the
creation of more paper trails which do little to protect
our loved ones. We are not interested in arresting, or
incarcerating, otherwise law abiding people for failing to
comply with unnecessary paper trails.
We want governments at all levels to concentrate on
lawmaking which reduces risk on our streets.
Laws that identify criminals for what they are and keeps
them out of our communities.
Laws that identify repeat and habitual criminals and treat
them accordingly.
Laws that have teeth in them.
Laws that police officers in this province can enforce
effectively, with the true belief that they are having an
impact on the criminal element we continually battle.
Bill C-68 has impact and focus. Its impact and focus is on
the law abiding firearm owner. This is not where
Saskatchewan police officers feel the impact and focus need
to be. Impact and focus must be on the criminal. We trust
you will deliver this message to Mr. Rock on our behalf."These quotes taken from a letter by Grant Obst, President
of the Saskatchewan Federation of Police Officers to the
Hon. Robert Mitchell, QC - Minister of Justice for
Saskatchewan dated April 28th, 1995.