REGINA – Saskatchewan’s federal Liberal members will be living under the gun if they support the new proposed gun law, hunting groups say.
Members of the Saskatchewan Wildlife Federation and other hunters will “attack every Liberal MP in Saskatchewan with the truth of this situation,” said Ed Begin of the SWF at a press conference last week. He also said gun owners here could recreate a situation that occurred in Ontario, where angry hunters took over a Liberal MP’s constituency organization.
“Some of them are starting to squirm already,” said Begin.
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One Liberal MP who doesn’t seem to be squirming is Souris-Moose Mountain MP Bernie Collins. Collins is spending much of his time putting himself in the line of fire of upset gun owners in southeastern Saskatchewan by attending meetings to discuss the gun control issue.
Collins said he’s “not going to lose much sleep” over threats by groups to take over Liberal organizations. But he cautions people to wait and see the legislation before condemning it.
The federal proposals have not yet been made into a bill, and Collins said he is not sure what the exact nature of the legislation will be.
But he said he doesn’t like the proposals he has seen so far. They do not follow the recommendations of a Liberal caucus committee he sat on in the fall and he will oppose provisions that are contrary to them, he said.
He said proposals to outlaw certain types of pistols, ban gun collectors’ collections at their death and make firearm registration mandatory go against the committee’s suggestions.
“We hit a Y in the road,” said Collins about why federal justice minister Allan Rock came out with more stringent proposals. “We went one way. The folks from justice went the other.”
Collins said he thought the committee’s recommendations would be accepted as the core of any new legislation, but “the process went forward with people who had a different timetable and a different agenda.”
He said he is willing to vote against legislation that he finds unacceptable.
Begin and the two other gun owners at the press conference denounced the new federal proposals for being costly and for trying to create a brimming new trough for bureaucrats.
Collins said he doesn’t want to build up any more bureaucracy and any new regulations should be “effective, efficient and affordable.
“If it doesn’t fulfill those criteria, I have to ask the question: What the hell are we doing?” he said.
When asked if the proposals he’s seen are effective, efficient and affordable, he replied: “No.”
All three parties in the Saskatchewan legislature, the NDP, the Progressive Conservatives and the Liberals, have come out against the proposed federal legislation.
