When it comes to Canada’s often tense debate around gun laws, most Canadians likely will not have heard of an RCMP database called the Firearms Reference Table, or FRT.
The FRT is a database used by the RCMP to help classify firearms. That classification determines whether a gun is non-restricted, restricted or prohibited.
Technically, the FRT isn’t a legal instrument, but instead just an internal RCMP tool based on definitions set out in the Criminal Code and Firearms Act. But in practice?
“It’s both the law and not the law,” said A.J. Somerset, the author of Arms: The Culture and Credo of the Gun.
That has literally nothing to do with the constitutionality of his mandate.
No, it’s fucking not. It’s a hobby that requires the mass manufacture and ownership of instant, point and click, murder tools.
Out of curiosity, in a perfect world and existing regulations excepted, what sort of firearm regulations would you like to see in Canada?
Trudeau having a mandated doesn’t mean he has carte blanche to violate the constitution. Unconstitutional laws have been passed, and struck down, before, and doubtless will be again. I’m not saying this particular situation is violating the constitution, but saying someone is elected prime minister means they can do whatever they want, or that it’s legal to do so, is demonstrably false.
My response wasn’t made in a vacuum, it was made in response to someone claiming that the issue was that he can’t delegate authority to the RCMP.
I never said that Trudeau couldn’t delegate authority. I said that the RCMP alone should not be designating which guns are legal or illegal.
In fact the Governor-in-Council (aka the Governor General) and the Privy Council have been doing this for years (https://www.securitepublique.gc.ca/cnt/trnsprnc/brfng-mtrls/prlmntry-bndrs/20200930/005/index-en.aspx and https://www.constitutionalstudies.ca/2019/07/governor-in-council/).