BERNARDO: New firearms ban insults RCMP, and more than 2 million gun owners

Tony Bernardo is the Executive Director of the CSSA"The issue with guns is not with criminal guns. It's with legal gun owners that have issues and we must protect our families," Nathalie Provost said during a November 25, 2024, press conference.It appears that Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc agrees with Ms. Provost’s assertion. Yesterday, the minister announced the prohibition of 104 families of firearms, covering 324 makes and models of firearms, that are owned by RCMP-vetted and federally-licensed firearms owners. This ministerial order now appears in the Canada Gazette.Provost’s statement and Minister LeBlanc’s subsequent prohibition of 324 makes and models of firearms raise an interesting and perhaps disturbing point.If licensed firearms owners — trained according to the Canadian Firearms Program and investigated for suitability to own firearms by the RCMP — are not “safe” to own, possess and use firearms, is Provost’s assertion that the RCMP and the Canadian Firearms Program failed to properly vet 2.2 million Canadians?That notion is absurd on its face. Decades of statistics prove this narrative is false, yet this federal government behaves as though it’s true.This insults the integrity of the RCMP.It insults the integrity of 2.2 million firearms owners.It insults the intelligence of Canadians who can, through government data, see through the smokescreen.What’s Included In The Ban?What we know so far:104 families of firearms are prohibited effective immediatelyThis covers 324 makes and models of firearms and any unnamed existing or future variants of themThe RCMP Firearms Program will notify all known owners of these now-Prohibited firearmsEnhanced licence qualifications will be introduced on Parliament’s first sitting day in JanuaryThese 104 families of firearms are eligible for the government’s Firearms Confiscation Compensation Scheme, but only if the firearm is surrendered to the government through this schemeNo compensation will be given for firearms that are deactivatedNo compensation will be given for firearms turned into policeNew magazine restrictions will be introduced “no later than March 2025”New additions to the Red and Yellow flag laws in Bill C-21 will be introduced in the springWhen questioned by reporters, the government admitted that only “a couple dozen firearms” have been confiscated, to date.Tony Bernardo is the Executive Director of the CSSA.

BERNARDO: New firearms ban insults RCMP, and more than 2 million gun owners

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