37th Parliament, 1st Session

Edited Hansard • Number 205

Thursday, June 13, 2002

 

STATEMENTS BY MEMBERS

Firearms Registration

[Hansard – Page 12670]

Mr. Garry Breitkreuz (Yorkton—Melville, Canadian Alliance): Mr. Speaker, access to information documents show that the justice minister has already privatized the gun registry and has spent more than $17.6 million in the process.

Documents show that BDP Business Data Services Limited has been processing firearms licences for two years and gun registrations for at least the last six months. This despite the fact that the Privacy Commissioner of Canada has still not completed his investigation into the privacy implications of the government's privatization plans for the Canadian firearms program.

The justice minister said privatization would improve services, but since BDP became involved in July of 2000 the number of firearms licences issued with the wrong photograph increased from zero in 1999 to hundreds in the last two years, a dramatic increase.

What happened to the justice minister's claims that the gun registry was working well and his promise of offering very good services through privatization? That is certainly not happening.

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