Gun association concerned over how guns are added to ban list

One group is raising concerns over how guns continue to be added to the banned firearms list in Canada without any sort of oversight.

Early last month, Justin Trudeau and the Liberal government banned about 1,500 assault-style guns following the mass murder spree carried out in Nova Scotia in April. The ban has been met with concern from gun owners and associations across the country.

Alison de Groot is the managing director of the Canadian Sporting Arms and Ammunition Association. She told Gormley on Thursday the issue is about more than just gun control.

“I think every Canadian should be concerned with the way this legislation happened; it sets a precedent. If it’s firearms today, another government could do this on another controversial issue — something like abortion or anything that’s a controversial issue. I think Canadians should be appalled at the way this was executed,” de Groot said.

The Firearms Reference Table is a tool businesses and law enforcement agencies use in Canada that has a list of all guns banned in the country. De Groot said it is controlled by the RCMP Firearms Centre, which has continued to add guns to that list since the ban was first announced.

“In addition to the 1,500 which were specifically named in the gazette of the order in council, we are tracking somewhere between 350 to 500 additional firearms that have been added. We do not have confirmation yet from the RCMP whether or not they’re finished,” de Groot said.

As of last Friday, de Groot said the RCMP had posted all additions up to May 26 to the reference table.

She finds that concerning because of how difficult the reference table can be to navigate and claims the RCMP has made it even more difficult.

“Unfortunately, the RCMP found it necessary to go in and remove the comments section so we have no idea, in some cases, what the rationale was on classifying non-restricted in the first place and now we can’t identify which ones have been changed by looking at the comments section,” she said.

“If the comments section references something in the order in council, then we know that firearm was affected by the order in council.”

She said the RCMP has been going in and changing things like variants in guns, guns exceeding a 20-millimetre bore diameter, and if the gun is capable of providing a muzzle energy greater than 10,000 joules.

“None of those things include the definition of that term,” she said.

She said the RCMP changed how it measures the bore diameter, but now that definition no longer lines up with the Canada Border Services Agency.

She says these constant changes aren’t fair for business owners.

“If you’re operating a business or an export business, it’s almost impossible to have flat ground under us right now because all of the power is with the RCMP firearms lab and we have no way to challenge their decisions,” she said. “We have no way to question their decisions and they can go indiscriminately into the firearms reference table.

“Before every sale, you have to look up that firearm … because today could be the day that firearm is prohibited.”