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Versions of this article also appeared in the following papers: TORONTO SUN: TAKING AIM AT FEDERAL SPENDING CALGARY SUN: TORY MP HAMMERING AWAY AT REGISTRY EDMONTON SUN: TAKING AIM AT FEDERAL SPENDING WINNIPEG SUN: TORY MP MONITORS REGISTRY
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TORY CRITIC TAKES AIM AT SOARING TAB -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To his Tory peers, MP Garry
Breitkreuz is known as the gun-registry watchdog. A former farmer, teacher and principal, Breitkreuz has taken on the gun registry -- the part of Canada's gun-control program that's been the focus of bad press -- from the moment it was conceived. He's made it his political mission to hammer away at the government over its ballooning costs. Breitkreuz has submitted more than 530 Access to Information requests since 1999 in his efforts to uncover the costs of the gun registry and elements of mismanagement. CLOSER TO $2B Although government figures forecast the costs of the controversial registry at $1 billion -- government officials now say that figure is actually hitting $946 million -- Breitkreuz insists it's more like $2 billion because other federal departments incur costs for the program that aren't included in the Canadian Firearms Centre's figures. And when Canadian Firearms Centre commissioner William Baker released his first report that noted 14,000 applications to acquire gun licences were rejected by the government, it prompted Breitkreuz to accuse Baker of throwing out a series of statistics in an attempt to divert attention from the costs of the program. "Why aren't they checking on the 170,000 who have been prohibited (to owning or possessing a firearm) by the courts?" Breitkreuz asked. A poll he commissioned last year showed Canadians of all political stripes believe the gun registry should be scrapped, with the cash funnelled back into law enforcement. "The Liberals are living in their own gun-control dreamland," Breitkreuz said at the time. "Canadian voters know that the gun registry isn't gun control, but for some inexplicable reason, the Liberals just don't get it." WHAT THE LIBERALS CAN’T
OR WON’T TELL YOU |