Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies MP Bob Zimmer likes what he's heard so far about pending gun control legislation the federal government is expected to introduce on Tuesday - but that could change as the details are rolled out.
Specifically, Zimmer has welcomed a promise by the federal public safety minister to toughen background checks for those seeking to get a licence to purchase firearms in answer to growing gang-related gun violence.
"There is already a really robust system in Canada to screen people...(but) if we keep a firearm out of one bad person's hands, then I'm good for that," Zimmer said last week.
Ralph Goodale made the vow at the end of a summit on the issue earlier this month. Possible measures include looking back further than the current five years of a prospective buyer's criminal history.
Gun homicides have almost doubled over the past four years, according to the ministry, rising to 223 in 2016. Over half are gang-related.
Depending on how the provincial governments respond, the background checks could include an examination of the purchaser's mental-health history.
Zimmer said someone with a mental-health issue should not be automatically be prevented from buying a gun but should be subject to a higher level of scrutiny.
"So a doctor needs to sign off or somebody else needs to advocate," Zimmer said.
Revival of the long-gun registry is out of the question.
"To be clear, we have said all along that we will not recreate a federal long-gun registry, and we won't," a ministry spokesperson said in an email to The Citizen.
However, the legislation could include other measures that may not sit well with Zimmer. In the past, he has been at odds with Goodale over the treatment of the Armalite AR-15 semi-automatic rifle.
In 2016, the federal government shot down an e-petition of more than 25,000 signatures that Zimmer introduced in the House of Commons calling on Goodale to remove the gun from restricted status.
Pro-gun control group Poly Remembers is now calling on Goodale to go one step further and completely ban private ownership of all semi-automatic "assault" weapons in Canada.
The organization, whose representatives include survivors of the Ecole Polytechnique and Dawson College mass shootings, also wants the Liberals to make good on a 2015 campaign promise to revive a requirement that vendors keep records of all firearms inventory and sales. It was eliminated by the former Conservative government.
Poly Remembers also wants the measure extended to private transfers.
"If the government really wants to help the police in their criminal investigations and their efforts to counter the illegal market, controls on gun sales cannot just be half measures; they must take into account all arms transfers, not just commercial ones," Poly Remembers spokeswoman Heidi Rathjen said in a press release.
