Petition to Stop C-71 Is Now the Most-Signed E-Petition on Guns

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(Update 22 July 2018: The petition stops on Thursday 26 July. It’s the second-most popular e-Petition ever, but most PAL holders haven’t signed it. Why not sign e-1608 and e-1605 now?)

TheGunBlog.ca — A petition to stop Bill C-71 took less than three days to become Canada’s most-signed electronic petition related to firearms.

Nationwide opposition is mounting against the proposed law aiming to ban more guns and strangle millions of lawful hunters, farmers and sport shooters with red tape, while leaving violent criminals alone.

Petition e-1608 opened at 10:55 a.m. Ottawa time on March 28 and had 25,357 signatures as of 09:25 a.m. today, according to the House of Commons website. That’s the strongest backing on a gun issue since 25,249 people signed Petition e-111 to classify AR-15 rifles as “Non-restricted” instead of “Restricted” in 2016. E-111 ran for four months.

The signatures are equivalent to 1.2 percent of the 2.1 million Canadians with gun licences. More than half came in the first 24 hours, and almost a third are from Ontario. You don’t need a gun licence or any interest in firearms to sign.

Ryan Slingerland, a 15-year old from Coalhurst, Alberta, initiated the petition, sponsored by his member of parliament, Rachael Harder of Lethbridge. It is the ninth most-signed e-petition since the service began in December 2015.

https://twitter.com/TheGunBlog/status/979792913315049474

It takes less than 1 minute to sign and confirm via an automatic e-mail. TheGunBlog.ca’s Bill C-71 page includes more petitions and actions to oppose the bill, such as OneClearVoice.ca to easily send a letter to your member of parliament and other politicians. More than 165,000 letters have been sent.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, hundreds of thousands of people signed paper petitions to stop or repeal Bill C-68, the Firearms Act. Both the Firearms Act and Bill C-71 were proposed by Liberal Party governments.

Bill C-71 would immediately classify more than 10,000 legally owned rifles as “Prohibited,” make it easier to ban other firearms, require specific authorizations to transport guns, require authorization from a government registrar for all firearm purchases, and expand background checks to cover an individual’s whole life.

The bill mentions “Registrar,” “registration” and “record” or “records” 66 times. It doesn’t refer to violence, crime or criminals at all.

Text of Petition e-1608

Petition to the House of Commons

Whereas:

  • Bill C-71, An Act to amend certain Acts and Regulations in relation to firearms, does nothing to tackle firearms violence, but rather adds further red tape on law-abiding firearms owners;
  • This legislation brings back the useless and ineffective long-gun registry; and
  • This legislation does not provide the resources to frontline police forces to tackle the true source of firearms violence : gangs and organized criminal enterprises.

We, the undersigned, Residents of Canada, call upon the House of Commons to scrap Bill C-71, An Act to amend certain Acts and Regulations in relation to firearms, and to instead devote greater resources to policing in Canada.

E-Petitions Related to Firearms

  • e-1608 (Open for Signatures): Scrap Bill C-71. 25,357 signatures.
  • e-111: Return AR-15 to “Non-restricted.” 25,249 signatures.
  • e-1093: Require Canadian Firearms Advisory Committee members to have a firearm Possession and Acquisition Licence. 16,330 signatures.
  • e-575: Legalize silencers. 11,127 signatures.
  • e-1605: (Open for Signatures) Require convicted criminals prohibited from owning firearms to report a change of address to police, as lawful firearm owners have to do. 604 signatures.

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