Canada's PM Justin Trudeau has announced a bill banning the purchase and sale of handguns
Key Takeaways:
- Following recent mass shootings in the United States, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has proposed a firearm ownership moratorium.
- According to the federal statistics office, violent crimes involving weapons account for less than 3% of all violent crimes in Canada.
- According to Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino, the country now has almost one million pistols, up from a million a decade ago.
Following current mass shootings in the United States, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recommended a freeze on handgun ownership in Canada, effectively prohibiting their importation and sale.
The law still needs to be passed by Parliament, although the ruling Liberals only have a minority of members.
"We're introducing legislation to enact a nationwide firearm ownership freeze," Trudeau said at a news conference attended by dozens of victims' families and friends.
"This implies that handguns will no longer be available for purchase, sale, transfer, or import anywhere in Canada," he explained. "In other words, we're limiting the number of handguns on the market."
The government outlawed 1,500 military-grade or assault-style rifles just days after Canada's worst mass shooting, which left 23 people dead in rural Nova Scotia in April 2020.
However, Trudeau admitted on Monday that gun violence is on the rise.
Last Thursday, the federal statistics office estimated that violent crimes using firearms account for less than 3% of all violent crimes in Canada.
However, since 2009, the per capita rate of weapons pointed at someone has nearly tripled, while the rate of guns fired with the intent to kill or wound has increased by fivefold.
Handguns were used in nearly two-thirds of gun crimes in metropolitan areas.
The biggest source of handguns, according to police, is smuggling from the United States, which is reeling from recent massacres at a school in Texas and a supermarket in New York state.
According to Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino, there are approximately one million pistols in the country, a huge increase from a decade earlier.
"People should be able to go to the store, their school, or their place of worship without fear," Trudeau said. People should be able to go to the park or a birthday party without fear of being hit by a stray gunshot.
"Gun violence is a complicated issue," he explained. "However, at the end of the day, the math is straightforward: the fewer weapons in our community, the safer everyone will be."
The proposed law would also take away firearms from anyone involved in domestic violence or stalking, as well as tighten border security and criminal penalties for gun trafficking, and take away guns from anyone deemed a risk to themselves or others.
Long-gun magazines with more than five bullets would also be prohibited.