Posted: Wednesday, 15 February 2012

The Canadian Labour Congress joins with the Coalition for Gun Control, police, women's and anti-violence organizations in condemning today's vote to end the gun registry. "We maintain that the gun registry is an important tool to ensure workplace and community safety", said CLC President Ken Georgetti. "It is more than disappointing that the government would choose to ignore the substantial decline in the number of homicides, domestic violence incidents and suicides using rifles and shotguns since the registry was implemented, and the fact that police use the registry daily to help them prevent, investigate and solve crimes."

By destroying the data contained in the registry, the government's legislation will ensure that any province or territory cannot use what has already been collected to set up their own registry. "This provision exposes the legislation as driven by ideology, not a concern for the responsible use of taxpayers' money," said Georgetti. "The real waste is to destroy something that could continue to be used to protect our communities and our first responders. Eliminating the registry and destroying the data will make workers' lives less safe."