Prime Minister Mark Carney is standing by both the Liberals’ gun buyback plan and his embattled public safety minister who was caught on tape questioning the program.
Speaking in the House of Commons Wednesday, Carney resisted continued calls from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre to fire Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree.
Anandasangaree found himself in hot water this week after leaked audio of the minister questioning the efficacy and motivation of the Liberals’ gun buyback program surfaced online, leading to the Conservatives’ push to have him removed from his post.
“His own minister of public safety says this government is doing it wrong. He was caught on tape saying the program won’t work,” Poilievre said during question period.
“The police say they won’t implement it, the minister says it’s a bad idea, but they’re only doing it for political reasons.”“ What the minister of public safety is doing, is doing it right, he’s correcting an inefficient system to provide Canadians with fair compensation” for their firearms, Carney shot back.
“What this government is doing is providing fair compensation for Canadians to return illegal firearms, illegal assault rifles.” After a mass shooting in Nova Scotia that resulted in the deaths of 22 people, the program, which was first announced by then-prime minister Justin Trudeau, outlawed more than 1,500 firearms of the “assault-style” and variants in 2020. Owners of the proposed banned firearms would be eligible for compensation.In the secretly-recorded conversation, which was first reported on by the Toronto Star on Sunday, Anandasangaree suggests to a constituent that municipal police forces lack the resources to enforce gun bans, and that he would approach the issue differently had he the chance.The public safety minister also suggested the program was motivated by political considerations in Quebec.
“Quebec is in a different place than other parts of Canada, right? Furthermore, the minister states, “This is something that is very much a big, big, big deal for many of the Quebec electorate that voted for us.” Anandasangaree stated in the recording that he would personally cover the difference between what the constituent receives from the buyback program and what he paid for his guns. Global News has also obtained the audio and has spoken to the man who recorded the conversation with Anandasangaree.
Carney stands by Liberal gun ban, embattled public safety minister
