Note: Pay particular attention to the second from last paragraph.
IANSA gets involved with Canadian domestic politics
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1147816220497&call_pageid=968332188492&col=968793972154
Keep registry, Canada told
London-based group says Tory plan counter to global trend
Province, mayor, police chiefs laud program as a `critical tool'
May 17, 2006. 05:13 AM
OLIVIA WARD
STAFF REPORTER
Any move to kill Canada's long-gun registry would be going against an international trend toward tougher firearms laws, warns a leading advocacy group that describes the spread of small arms as a "global crisis."
"Around the world, the prevailing trend is towards tightening national gun legislation," said Anthea Lawson, spokeswoman of the London-based International Action Network on Small Arms, an umbrella group of about 700 member organizations.
"A growing number of countries are recognizing the vital role of gun registries in reducing the flow of guns from the legal to the illegal market, and thus in preventing gun deaths and injuries," she said.
Governments are increasingly aware of the enormous human cost of gun violence, which causes 1,000 deaths a day worldwide, Lawson added.
"They are setting up or improving their gun registries as well as their gun licensing requirements. So any move to weaken a gun registry is a move in the opposite direction to the international trend. It's also a great shame, since in Canada, as in other countries, tightening the gun laws has produced a dramatic reduction in gun deaths."
Reaction by Lawson and others comes amid fears that yesterday's report by Auditor General Sheila Fraser will provide ammunition for the Conservative government to live up to a long-standing promise to kill the long-gun registry. Fraser's audit highlighted cost overruns in the program and found that the former Liberal government hid the true cost of the registry from Parliament.
Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day, whose portfolio includes the gun registry, has a news conference scheduled for today and is expected to announce amnesties or fee waivers in advance of possibly killing the long-gun registry.
Yesterday, the Ontario government urged Ottawa to keep the registry in some form, saying it makes the streets safer because police can check when they're called to a home whether registered weapons are inside.
"Police tell me they use it thousands of times a day, every day," said Attorney General Michael Bryant. "There's no way that scrapping the registry is about public safety. I don't know what it's about," he added.
"Amidst the gun crimes being visited upon cities across the country, it seems amazing to me that this government would actually get rid of what's considered a critical crime-fighting tool."
If there are management concerns about the registry, the federal government should fix them, Bryant said.
"I think we need to get over what happened in the past, in terms of the indefensible set-up of the registry."
Premier Dalton McGuinty said "the challenge here is making sure that we get a (gun registry) model that is affordable."
It would be difficult for Ontario to continue a gun registry on its own because of constitutional questions, Bryant said.
Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair said last night that, in general, the registry helps protect police officers because it provides them with information about what guns might be in a home.
However, he said, "we know the gun problem in Toronto is overwhelmingly a problem of illegal handguns.
"Gangsters who carry guns in the city of Toronto do not register those guns so any changes in the gun registry are not going to have a significant impact on our efforts to control the operation and use of illegal handguns on our streets."
Toronto Mayor David Miller called any move to scale back the gun registry "appalling."
"I think the gun registry's an incredibly important thing; it should be expanded," Miller told reporters following the release of the auditor general's report.
"Obviously the implementation was a boondoggle," Miller said. "But the registry exists now. We're talking about whether it's an effective tool, and it's incredibly important. Guns have no place on the streets of our city. They absolutely have no place whatsoever.
"And for a federal government to go the other way, and in effect make it much more difficult for police services to track guns, and for us to prevent the uses of guns in crime, is appalling.
"That's just not acceptable for the safety of the people of Toronto."
York Region Police Chief Armand La Barge said the gun registry helps save lives, allowing officers to seize all of the shotguns and rifles in the hands of dangerous suspects.
"We've been strong supporters of the gun registry," said La Barge, who's also head of the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police.
"We're concerned about where they (the Conservative government) are going."
He said taking shotguns and rifles out of the registry endangers the lives of members of the general public, and police officers as well.
"I don't see that as a positive step forward whatsoever."
La Barge said Canadian police officers make about 6,500 queries on the gun registry daily.
If the long-gun registry were disbanded, Canada could face questions next month at a major United Nations meeting to review the five-year-old Program of Action on Small Arms, which commits governments to crack down on the spread of gun violence, Lawson said.
Canada has been "one country generally regarded as positive on the issue," Lawson said. "It's a member of a group of countries that have come up with a good text on controlling international arms transfers. With the United Kingdom, (which leads the group), it's trying to build a consensus." (Emphasis added.)
With files from Rob Ferguson, Peter Edwards, John Spears and Dale AnnE Freed
