Ottawa takes steps to buy back guns

Government to spend $29M on ‘IT solution’ to remove assault-style firearms from communities

A small item from the new federal budget offers a hint at how the government plans to carry out its buyback of prohibited firearms.

Over five years, the federal government intends to spend $29 million to help Public Safety Canada and the RCMP implement an “IT solution to compensate firearms owners and businesses and safely remove assault-style firearms from Canadian communities.”

According to the ministry of public safety, the funding will be used to create an online management system to facilitate the acquisition, destruction or disposal of more than 100,000 prohibited assault-style weapons, such as the AR-15. The military-grade firearms were banned through an order-in-council in May 2020 on the grounds they have no place in hunting or sport shooting.

The government still expects to spend more on the buyback program. In 2021, the parliamentary budget officer estimated it could cost anywhere between $47 million and $756 million depending on the number of guns affected, the takeup rate and pricing structure.

The regulatory ban in May 2020 came less than two weeks after 22 people were killed in Nova Scotia in what remains Canada’s deadliest mass shooting. According to an Ipsos poll at the time, four in five Canadians support the government’s move to outlaw militarystyle assault weapons.

“This is a first step toward the buyback program and lays the groundwork for it,” spokesperson Audrey Champoux told the Star in an emailed statement. “It has no connection to any registry. This IT system will be used to facilitate the buyback, not maintain and track guns.”

Champoux later stressed that the program will “absolutely” not involve a registry. She added that the ministry had no further “operational details” to share.

The mandatory buyback program, which has drawn the ire of Conservatives and gun rights advocates, would require owners of banned guns to either sell them to the government, have them rendered inoperable at federal expense or lawfully disposed of.

Currently, an amnesty is in place until Oct. 30, 2023 to protect lawful owners of the now-prohibited firearms from criminal liability while they take steps to comply with the law. It’s unclear whether that deadline will be extended for a second time as the government continues to design the system.

Though British, Australian and New Zealand governments have done so, this is the first time a Canadian government has tried to purchase recently-prohibited guns from their owners, said Blake Brown, a history professor at Saint Mary’s University.

“They seem to be struggling a bit in figuring it out,” said Brown, author of “Arming and Disarming: A History of Gun Control in Canada.” However, he understands the rationale. If the government’s really serious about getting these guns out of circulation, he continued, it makes sense to offer compensation for them as it will boost compliance.

Last month, the government suffered a blow to its gun control efforts when backlash among opposition MPs, gun owners and Indigenous groups forced the government to pull two controversial amendments to Bill C-21, legislation that would freeze the sale of hand guns.

The withdrawn revisions would have banned hundreds of other makes and models of assault-style weapons, and entrenched an “evergreen” definition of what kinds of guns should be prohibited.

In an interview with the Star last week, Mendicino was tight-lipped about whether the government planned to introduce new but similar amendments, emphasizing the role of the House of Commons public safety committee in revising Bill C-21.

“We are currently working with our parliamentary colleagues to craft a clear solution that will keep assault-style weapons off our streets,” Champoux said.