Gun Registry Did Nothing To Prevent Montreal Shooting

September 20, 2006

Last week’s horrific shooting rampage at Dawson College in Montreal hit Canadians hard. Anastasia De Sousa’s parents sent her off to school that morning, confident she was safe and secure and would return home for dinner. Only in a parent’s worst nightmare could they imagine their child gunned-down by a deranged madman.

Out of the ashes of our nation’s mourning, confusion has now arisen among some Canadians, thanks to misinformation being spread by a selection of politicians with their own misguided agenda.

That the federal opposition party leaders, including Jack Layton, Bill Graham and Gilles Duceppe, along with Quebec Premier Jean Charest, are attempting to twist this tragedy into a rallying cry to ‘save the gun registry’ quite frankly boggles the mind! Certainly not when any reasonable, logical individual can easily recognize that the Dawson College shooting only serves to perfectly demonstrate the utter uselessness of the federal long-gun registry!

Kimveer Gill legally purchased and registered all of his guns – a Beretta CX4 Storm semi-automatic rifle, a 9-millimetre pistol, and a 12-gauge shotgun. He used only the handgun and rifle, restricted firearms that must continue to be registered under proposed Conservative government changes to the Firearms Act.

In other words, the misguided and failed long-gun registry, instituted by the former Liberal government and costing taxpayers almost TWO BILLION DOLLARS, did not prevent this tragedy and never could.

This man was quite obviously mentally unstable, and under Liberal gun laws, he had no problem building an arsenal of weapons. Then again, gun registries, permits, licenses, training and storage regulations are pointless when it comes to people like Gill.

As I and many others have repeatedly stated throughout the past decade: “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.” People like Kimveer Gill. Criminals, gang members and others who place little value on human life.

And that’s where precious federal resources must be allocated. Instead of targeting farmers, our federal laws must institute practical measures that reduce the risk of these tragedies.

Frustratingly, we will never be able to eliminate such incidents. However, we can attempt to improve methods of identifying the potential perpetrators of these crimes, whether through enhanced Internet surveillance or other measures. For those with a known history of violence or gun crime, we can boost sentencing, something our Conservative government has already undertaken through legislation.

We can also look at non-legislative measures to reduce the loss of life and injury when these tragedies do occur. For example, the new policy that police officers immediately enter a shooting scene has been credited with preventing the death of more young students at Dawson College.

Liberal Leader Bill Graham has now announced he will force his MPs to vote against Conservative legislation to scrap the gun registry. Never mind that about a dozen of his MPs have voted against funding the registry in the past or have said they would support Conservative efforts to scrap it.

Mr. Graham’s use of this tragedy to justify forcing an undemocratic “whipped vote” upon his MPs is misplaced. Far from keeping our children safe, he wants to rob resources from initiatives that just might.