Proposed new government regulations would end the current requirement that long gun sellers record sales data that could be used by police to track firearm ownership.
The regulations, part of the government’s abolition of the long gun registry, were tabled in Parliament and sent to the Senate committee on legal and constitutional affairs for study June 14.
It is expected to approve them this week.
As he tabled the regulations in the House of Commons, public safety minister Vic Toews said it was important to stop the unnecessary collection of data of sales of unrestricted guns.
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Quebec has filed a court case demanding information on Quebec gun ownership so it can create its own gun registry to replace the federal version in the province.
Toews insists federal data in the gun registry bank collected for 17 years will not be made available to provinces, and data on sales of unregistered rifles should not be kept.
“The Ending the Long Gun Registry Act repeals the requirement for law-abiding duck hunters and farmers to register non-restricted firearms, and these proposed regulations will ensure that a long gun registry is not created through the backdoor and the will of Parliament is respected,” the minister said in a news release.
The result would be that gun sellers would not have to keep records on who buys non-restricted rifles and where they live.
In the Senate, when challenged over why the regulations had to be referred to committee for approval immediately, Conservative senator Claude Carignan said it is important to get the rules governing the end of the long gun registry operating quickly.
“This new bill has come into force and the regulations are necessary to allow the provisions of the bill to be applied quickly,” he said in the Senate June 13.
“Not adopting the regulations in the coming days could mean delaying their adoption until the fall.”
He said quick approval is necessary to “avoid causing difficulties for hundreds of thousands of people.”
