Date: Tue, 7 Dec 1999 09:03:17 -0600 Message-Id: <199912071503.JAA04764@broadway.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca> X-Authentication-Warning: broadway.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca: majordomo set sender to owner-cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca using -f From: owner-cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (Cdn-Firearms Digest) To: cdn-firearms-digest@broadway.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Subject: Cdn-Firearms Digest V3 #227 Reply-To: cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Sender: owner-cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Errors-To: owner-cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Precedence: normal Cdn-Firearms Digest Tuesday, December 7 1999 Volume 03 : Number 227 In this issue: Are we safe? service!! AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT: RENEWALS Re: [alert] tonight on Radio Station KFRE AM 940 out of Fresno Toronto police launch firearms amnesty..... Re: Credit Cards Fwd: LIBERALS KILL BREITKREUZ PROPERTY RIGHTS BILL FOR THE THIRD TIME Urgent Reminder: Phone-in "Gun Control" Debate Gold-medallist Thom sticks to her guns ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 09:04:47 -0600 From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Are we safe? PUBLICATION: Montreal Gazette DATE: 1999.12.04 EDITION: FINAL BYLINE: DAVID GAMBLE Are we safe?: Critics say Canada's beefed-up gun-control legislation does nothing to prevent another massacre like the one at Ecole Polytechnique Some people say the only good thing to come out of the Ecole Polytechnique massacre 10 years ago is that it prodded Ottawa into updating gun-control laws and made Canada a safer place. David Tomlinson, president of the National Firearms Association, doesn't agree. He says what happened on Dec. 6, 1989, when Marc Lepine killed 14 young women with his semi-automatic rifle, has been terribly distorted. At the centre of the 4-year-old Firearms Control Act, introduced by then federal Justice Minister Allan Rock with much fanfare and reference to the Montreal killings, is the creation of a gun registry that requires 3 million gun-owners to register their 7 million rifles and other long arms by 2003. (Canada's one million or so handguns already require to be licensed.) But for Tomlinson, who has spent most of the last decade battling Ottawa's gun-control efforts, nothing in the legislation prevents someone like Lepine from arriving at the Universite de Montreal's engineering school with a gun once again. Real gun control, he said, is based on proper gun education. ``Lepine walked into a room full of active young men and active young women,'' Tomlinson said from Edmonton, where the firearms association is based. ``Anybody who is trained even to a minor degree knows that situation could have ended right there and should have ended right there with a maximum of one person dead. ``If one person had charged him and knocked him tail over tea kettle, there's a damn good possibility that enough of them would have followed to have pinned him down and made him completely inert or inactive until the police got there.'' It didn't happen, he said, because Canadians fail to properly teach their children about guns. ``What we've done is handicap our children by not teaching them about violence. We teach them the police will take care of it.'' Tomlinson accuses the Liberal government of using the gun registry to court the favour of generally gun-ignorant masses. The registry, he said, is unworkable, impractical and utterly useless in stopping future Lepines from unleashing their evil. Tomlinson is not alone in thinking the gun registry is not effective. Gary Mauser, who teaches business administration at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, B.C., and has studied the federal gun-control efforts, says the gun registry is overly bureaucratic and will save few lives. New figures show that since Ottawa began registering guns last December, nearly 550 licenses have been refused and 438 revoked for public-safety reasons. But the registry has been plagued by cost overruns and administrative screwups since it opened a year ago, and it has an enormous load to carry in the next year if it is to meet its deadlines. ``It is doomed to failure,'' Mauser said. ``It cannot work. ``In their defence, this is a very hard thing to do, even dysfunctionally,'' he said. ``The logic of a registry is that by knowing where guns are, this will help police ... keep track of things.'' Problem is, criminals don't usually register their weapons, and a registry is by far the least cost-efficient way of fighting gun crime. Cost overruns began almost immediately. The start-up cost, pegged at $85 million originally, has now officially ballooned to $120 million. Mauser insists the real figure is more like $300 million and counting. The annual cost had been pegged at $100 million for the first three years, with the idea it would average out at $60 million a year over the first decade. Federal officials continue to insist that operating costs will be recouped by user fees - $25 a piece - something Mauser said is unlikely. Money isn't the only problem. A massive bottleneck has developed, with only 86,000 identity license cards issued for 177,000 applications received in the last year. Gun-owners are being told to get the cards by 2001 and registration certificates for individual weapons by 2003. That means more than 2.5 million applications for ID cards will have to be processed in the next year. Another glitch has come with the legislation's plan to ban 555,000 short-barreled handguns known as ``Saturday night specials.'' These owners were originally given until Dec. 1, 1998 to turn in their weapons or face having them confiscated by police. The extension of the amnesty to this week, and then to Jan. 1, 2001, only put off a showdown with thousands of shooting enthusiasts and collectors who would have seen their guns confiscated without compensation. The Reform and Conservative parties have vowed to repeal the law if elected. Six provinces, including Alberta and Ontario, and two territories are challenging the registry as unconstitutional. A hearing before the Supreme Court is expected in February. What's more, the three Prairie provinces have refused to implement the registry, so Ottawa has turned the job over to the RCMP - which has increased costs. Federal officials say these difficulties are simply growing pains, but Mauser said they're rooted in the way the Liberals created the gun law. Rock failed to follow the ``classic Canadian approach of accommodation and consultation'' with gun groups when he designed the law, Mauser said, and the combination of registration and confiscation was a recipe for confrontation. ``Allan Rock created the Canadian gun lobby,'' he said. There was opposition to gun control in the months after the massacre as well. In the days following the Polytechnique killings, then federal justice minister Doug Lewis, who had been studying a new gun law, insisted he would not be rushed into anything. That changed in early 1990, when Prime Minister Brian Mulroney appointed Kim Campbell to the justice portfolio and put gun legislation at the top on her to-do list. It was not easy; there was immediate resistance within and outside the Conservative Party. After two tries, Campbell passed a law that aimed to close many of the loopholes that had allowed Lepine to so easily commit his crime. It set stricter maximum penalties for firearms offences, set a 28-day waiting period for a permit to buy a firearm, and banned semi-automatic weapons that have been converted to automatic. These changes all remain in place today. Campbell's law also raised the age requirement for a firearms-acquisition certificate, to 18 from 16, with parental consent needed for youths 16 and 17 to own a gun. And it gave police more discretion to check applicants and turn down those they feel are unfit to own a gun. Two references were required to seek a certificate. Campbell's bill pleased gun-control activists, but it wasn't until Rock's law that they pronounced themselves completely satisfied. Eight years after her gun law was passed, Campbell, now Canada's consul-general in Los Angeles, is clearly still still proud of her work, but she wonders if Rock really helped the cause of gun control by pursuing registration. ``Gun control is the most divisive justice issue in Canada, more than abortion,'' Campbell said in a telephone interview from her Los Angeles-area home. ``I thought we did all of the things that were the highest priority for public safety. My goal was to hive off what I would call the Rambos from the responsible firearms-owner community. Most responsible firearms-owners don't oppose good gun-control legislation. ... You don't have to be a homicidal maniac to have a firearm.'' Campbell said she tried hard to bring most gun-owners on side. The Tories considered registration but dropped the idea, realizing it wasn't worth the grief, she suggested. ``There are certain things in gun control that have a certain public appeal, but when you're legislating you need to look at the research on what works, what doesn't, and what really has an impact, recognizing you're never going to do away entirely with gun violence,'' Campbell said. ``There's no evidence that registering guns reduces the level of gun violence. It's not that I don't think it's something worth doing, (but) it's something you do much later.'' The former justice minister and prime minister refused to elaborate, perhaps sensing her views conflict with her role as a diplomat representing Prime Minister Jean Chretien. ``I don't want to be in the position of criticizing the government now,'' she said. A frustrated Justice Minister Anne McLellan said in an interview she is concerned that Canadians are getting the wrong idea about the registry from negative publicity about its growing pains. ``Is it a story for the media to write about our efforts and the efforts of the gun coalition to create a culture of safety and responsibility? No, for most media it's not a story,'' said McLellan, one of only two Liberal MPs from Alberta. ``But it is a story to write about the fact that there have been some glitches in start-up and that it's cost a little more than Allan originally projected or that sometimes people don't get their registrations as quickly as they thought they would. That's the story,'' she said with a growl. McLellan said the events at the Polytechnique are never far away when she thinks about gun control. ``It's important to do whatever we reasonably can to prevent these kind of events happening in the future.'' She noted the number of licenses that have been refused and revoked since the gun registry began last December. ``These numbers far exceed anything we've done in the years before, because we're doing a better job. The system permits a better job of flagging people who are potentially a problem and doing the necessary background checks.'' She welcomed a Gallup poll of more than 1,000 Canadians made public last week that showed nearly three-quarters of Canadians support the gun registry and are willing to forgive its troubles. The same poll showed seven in 10 want even stricter gun-control laws. Support was strongest in Quebec (88 per cent) and weakest in the Prairie provinces (54 per cent). Eight of nine urban residents from big cities like the registry plan. ``There will be a registry. We've made that decision. We're not going back on this decision,'' McLellan said. A similarly exasperated Wendy Cukier said she can't believe she's still fighting the battle for gun control a decade after the Polytechnique. ``For all the ongoing opposition that we face every day, we know that it's making a difference every day,'' said Cukier, co-founder and president of the Coalition for Gun Control, born in the aftermath of the massacre. ``A number of the parents of the young women who were killed in Montreal have said that they think the new law is a monument to their children.'' Criticism of the gun registry is both predictable and unfair, Cukier said, noting that the Canadian Police Association and the group representing police chiefs are behind the government's efforts, having resisted calls to change their positions last summer. ``Virtually every group concerned with violence prevention and public safety in this country has stuck behind this law,'' she said. ``I heartily resent the fact that all those provinces are spending taxpayers' money fighting against the law and at the same time they're complaining about the expenditures of the federal government trying to implement the law. ``The evidence is pretty good that the progressive tightening of gun control over the last 10 years has had a fairly significant effect. There are all sorts of other things that have had an effect, but we know that gun-related deaths are at the lowest they have been in almost 30 years.'' Cukier believes someone like Lepine would be less likely now to achieve his twisted goal of making ``feminists'' pay for his failure to get into engineering school. ``You reduce the risk, you can't eliminate the possibility that somebody like him - and I prefer not to mention his name - would get a gun.'' Surprisingly, Cukier said her big problem isn't facing off with the gun lobby. ``Our biggest problem is that Canadians value gun control and they don't bother to do anything about it. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 09:00:14 -0600 From: Garry Dormody Subject: service!! Hello folks, Here's one for the books. Friday past I received a new copy of my ATT and on going through it I noticed that I was four guns short on the list of firearms for which I had permission to take to the local range. I called the firearms office and talked to the head guy there and he checked for me immediately. He said that the four missing firearms were on a second page which, for some reason, did not get printed off and included with my letter. He apologized and said that he would forward it to me in the mail and added that he hoped that I wasn't inconvenienced. I mentioned jokingly that my new Para Ordnance P.40 was on the missing list and that I had hoped to use it this weekend. Get this, after finishing for the day he personally delivered my missing page to my door! Kind of blew me away! Now if I could only get my FN back on the list I would be doubly happy. To much to hope for ? There's always hope I guess, if not we all wouldn't be fighting this thing so hard. Safe shootin' everyone, dorm ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 09:00:39 -0600 From: Kelly Weiss Subject: AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT: RENEWALS I would appreciate any comments or input other readers of this digest may have relative to the following: I previously had a "PERMIT TO CARRY" - Form C-302 (PTC). When I tried to renew my "PERMIT TO CARRY" [in 1998], I was told there was no need too as it had already been extended automatically for a further one year period. I am now in the position where my one-year extension is almost over. After having reviewed previous digest reports, I believe my old "PERMIT TO CARRY" was actually converted to an "AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT" (ATT). I also believe that the terms and conditions that appeared on my old "PERMIT TO CARRY" (PTC) were transferred to my "AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT" (ATT) and consequently, were the terms and conditions that applied to my ATT. So that I might obtain my ATT renewal in advance of my existing ATT expiry date, I submitted an "APPLICATION FOR AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT RESTRICTED FIREARMS AND PROHIBITED FIREARMS, INCLUDING PROHIBITED HANDGUNS" (Form JUS 679) on 18 November 1999. Based on what I read in various digest reports, I wrote the following narrative in the area where the form asks for "FIREARM REGISTRATION CERTIFICATE NO." etc: PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS AN APPLICATION FOR A RENEWAL; IT IS NOT AN "AB INITIO" APPLICATION FOR AN AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT. ALSO PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS A DEMAND, MADE UNDER SECTION 337 OF THE CRIMINAL CODE OF CANADA, FOR A RENEWAL OF THE 1998-1999 PERMIT TO CARRY/AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT (PHOTOCOPY ENCLOSED) WITH THE SAME TERMS AND CONDITIONS THAT WERE ON THE 1998 AUTHORIZATION TO TRANSPORT. I did not write any particulars regarding any firearm. I requested a three (3) year ATT. Your comments/opinions/thoughts would be appreciated. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 09:00:51 -0600 From: "Ron McCutcheon" Subject: Re: [alert] tonight on Radio Station KFRE AM 940 out of Fresno I missed it. Hope you will put a message on CFD as to how it went. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 09:00:50 -0600 From: "Alan Harper" Subject: Toronto police launch firearms amnesty..... >From the history of the city, some of it very recent, the senior officers and the former Toronto registrars would be the most likely ones to be in possession of firearms needing an amnesty. Bye. Al. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 09:00:35 -0600 From: "Keith P. de Solla, P.Eng" Subject: Re: Credit Cards cougr41@telusplanet.net wrote: > > In fact, I have made several "refuse to pay" calls to VISA. What happens > is you call VISA on the toll free line and tell them you do not remember > making this purchase, or perhaps there was a mix up in card numbers (it > still happens in non-electronic environments), or perhaps you were > double charged. You shouldn't even have to give a reason. Its your account & you should be able to put a 'stop payment' on any transaction. - -- Keith P. de Solla kdesolla@shield.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 7 Dec 1999 09:02:39 -0600 From: "Jean-Francois Avon" Subject: Fwd: LIBERALS KILL BREITKREUZ PROPERTY RIGHTS BILL FOR THE THIRD TIME >From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" >To: "'Firearms Digest'" >Subject: LIBERALS KILL BREITKREUZ PROPERTY RIGHTS BILL FOR THE THIRD TIME >Date: Mon, 6 Dec 1999 15:09:54 -0500 NEWS RELEASE December 6, 1999 For Immediate Release LIBERALS KILL BREITKREUZ PROPERTY RIGHTS BILL FOR THE THIRD TIME Manitoba Court of Appeal: "the right to 'enjoyment of property' is not a constitutionally protected, fundamental part of Canadian society." Ottawa - Today, Garry Breitkreuz, MP for Yorkton-Melville, lost his third battle with the Liberal government to provide a minimum of protection for property rights in federal law. "I just can't believe it," said Breitkreuz. "In February of this year the courts ruled that there is no constitutionally protected right to property in Canada, and today the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice was trying to convince everyone that the Bill of Rights and common law precedence still protect our right to property. Well, it sure didn't protect David Bryan when he tried to sell his own grain that he grew on his own land." Breitkreuz told the House of Commons, "For violating the Canadian Wheat Board's soviet-style decree, Mr. Bryan spent a week in jail, was fined $9,000 and received a 2-year suspended sentence. Mr. Bryan, with the help of the National Citizen's Coalition, appealed his conviction on the grounds that it violated his property rights as guaranteed in the Canadian Bill of Rights, passed by this Parliament in 1960. On February 4th, 1999 the Manitoba Court of Appeal ruled against David Bryan's right to sell his own grain that he grew on his own land. Page 14 of the ruling the Manitoba Court of Appeal stated, "Section 1(a) of the Canadian Bill of Rights, which protects property rights through a 'due process' clause, was not replicated in the Charter, and the right to 'enjoyment of property' is not a constitutionally protected, fundamental part of Canadian society." "The courts couldn't have made it any clearer for anyone who cares enough about human rights to read the judgement," stated Breitkreuz. "The Liberal government seems most interested in maintaining its absolute control over private property in Canada." Conservative Peter McKay and Reformers Rahim Jaffer and Roy Bailey spoke in support of Breitkreuz's property rights bill. The Bloc failed to put up a speaker. NDPer Nelson Riis joined the Liberals in opposing the proposed legislation advancing the argument that U.S. corporations have better protection of property rights under NAFTA than Canadians do in federal law. As in the two previous debates of his bill, the Liberals opposed both of Breitkreuz's motions to make his property rights bill votable and to refer it to the Sub-Committee on Human Rights for further study. Breitkreuz's bill was previously defeated on October 5, 1998 (Bill C-304) and November 19, 1996 (Bill C-284). "Czech President Vaclav Havel hit the nail on the head when he said, "Human rights rank above state rights because people are the creation of God." Breitkreuz concluded, "Unfortunately, the Liberals have proven by their legislation and by their response to my bill that they believe property rights are a privilege government grants to the people, not a fundamental right of the people that government should protect and guarantee in Canadian law." - -30- For a copy of Garry's speech, please call: Yorkton Office: (306) 782-3309 Ottawa Office: (613) 992-4394 e-mail: breitg0@parl.gc.ca ===================END FORWARDED MESSAGE=================== ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 7 Dec 1999 09:02:45 -0600 From: "John Perocchio" Subject: Urgent Reminder: Phone-in "Gun Control" Debate Phone-in show on "Gun Control" CPAC Station (Channel 24 in Ottawa) 9 PM ET (21:00 Hrs) Show called "Roundtable" ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 7 Dec 1999 09:02:31 -0600 From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Gold-medallist Thom sticks to her guns PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen DATE: 1999.12.07 EDITION: FINAL SECTION: City PAGE: B1 / Front COLUMN: Brown's Beat BYLINE: Dave Brown SOURCE: The Ottawa Citizen ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo: Wayne Cuddington, the Ottawa Citizen / Linda Thom, Canada's 1984 Olympic gold medal winner in pistol competition, has been featured in television ads put out by the National Rifle Association. Gold-medallist Thom sticks to her guns It didn't take long to spot what was missing during a conversation yesterday with Linda Thom. Gun-control legislation was the reason I called, but because of the timing, it easily slipped into stories marking the 10th anniversary of the murder of 14 women at the Universite de Montreal. Never once during a lengthy conversation about the incident did she mention the name of the insane man who killed those women in what has become known as the Montreal massacre. The omission was deliberate. She believes by tying his name to the event, he in some sick way wins. More people will remember his name than will remember the names of his victims. Gun control is always a hot topic with Ms. Thom, Canada's 1984 Olympic gold medal winner in pistol competition, and one of the country's high-profile, responsible gun owners. She doesn't make a secret of her opposition to the current method of trying to control firearms. She was an outspoken leader at a protest rally on Parliament Hill in September 1998. Canadians settling into their winter homes in Florida have been reporting seeing her on their televisions showing support for the National Rifle Association. That was the reason for the call yesterday. They want to know why. ``They (NRA) asked me to do that taping during the summer. I simply went on record as being opposed to Bill C-68. I believe it is doing the opposite of what is intended. It will decrease public safety. The bad guys are not going to register their guns. It is part of an anti-gun movement to eliminate gun ownership. ``I believe that is a move that could create more victims.'' It's that line of thinking that puts her in much the same mindset as the hardline NRA. For that reason she publicly showed her opposition to current registration in Canada. Her comments on registration refer only to long guns. Registering of handguns has been mandatory in Canada since 1934. While Canada goes about the expensive business of registering and trying to control firearms, she believes the money could be better spent. She predicts it will soon hit the half-billion dollar mark. The government has indicated a willingness to spent up to $730 million by 2003. ``Much of that money could be better spent hiring more police,'' says the pistol champion. She believes more money should be aimed at going into schools with counselling services that may reduce the risk of individual acts of violence. She believes the knowledge that there may be another gun around acts as a deterrent. ``Look at what's happening in England. Armed home invasions are on the increase. ``We are told to leave it to the police to protect us. I believe that's impossible. There are dangerous people, and there are guns. Responsibility and accountability are the issues. Total control just isn't possible.'' That a man could carve his name into history by such a mad act as the Montreal massacre is a media flaw she would like to see corrected. Keeping his name alive could encourage another nutbar willing to die to be noticed. ------------------------------ End of Cdn-Firearms Digest V3 #227 **********************************