PUBLICATION: The Chronicle-Herald
DATE: 2004.07.30
SECTION: Opinion
PAGE: A7

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Voice of the People

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Registry robbery

Canada’s $1-billion-plus gun registry is being used by a U.S. project management centre for senior corporate executives as a case study in incompetence and financial mismanagement. New York-based Baseline has published an analysis of the gun registry titled: “Canada Firearms: Armed Robbery.” It reports the system has become so cumbersome that an independent review board recommended it be scrapped.

Meanwhile, supporters of the registry, like police chiefs head Edgar MacLeod and the editorial board of this newspaper, have offered no explanation as to why shootings continue to plague the city of Halifax – exactly the shootings we were told the platinum-priced registry would prevent.

Perhaps, while they are at it, supporters of the registry could tell us how a dog was more effective than a billion-plus program in preventing James Paul Stanson, a licensed owner with registered guns, from going on a shooting rampage in Ontario.

Taxpayers may be interested in the answers to these questions before spending over $100 million-plus a year more on this “case study in incompetence and financial mismanagement.” But wait, Paul Martin’s Liberals have said they will cap the cost of the registry at $25 million. What they failed to mention is that they will continue to spend over $75 million a year to license people like Mr. Stanson. Just goes to show you a dollar doesn’t go as far as it used to. Especially a dollar in the hands of Paul Martin.

Al Muir, Stellarton