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THE SENATE
Wednesday, November 29, 1995
Firearms Bill Inquiry
Hon. Anne C. Cools rose
pursuant to notice of November 23, 1995: That she will call the attention of the Senate to
the speech that she had intended to give on Wednesday, 22nd November, 1995, during debate
on the motion of the Honourable Senator Beaudoin, seconded by the Honourable Senator
Grimard, for the adoption of the sixteenth report of the Standing Senate Committee on
Legal and Constitutional Affairs (Bill C-68, An act respecting firearms and other weapons,
with amendments) presented in the Senate on Monday, 20th November, 1995; the speech which
she was unable to give due to time limitations imposed by the Senate Order concluding
debate by 5:15 pm and votes at 5:30 pm on Wednesday, 22nd November, 1995.
The Hon. the Speaker:
Honourable senators, before Senator Cools proceeds with this inquiry, I should like to put
a statement on the record. I am somewhat troubled by the terms used by the honourable
senator in stating her inquiry. The notice makes it explicitly clear that the speech which
the senator intends to make was originally to be given as part of the debate on the
consideration of the report of the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional
Affairs respecting Bill C-68. By order of the Senate, debate on this report and the third
reading of the bill concluded last Wednesday, and the matter has been decided by a vote of
the Senate. My reservations about the terms of this inquiry stem mainly from the long
established practice mentioned in Beauchesne's 6th Edition, at citations 479, 480(1) and
(2). The citations make it clear that: 479. A Member may not speak against or
reflect upon any determination of the House, unless intending to conclude with a motion
for rescinding it. Then 480(1) says, in part: ... Members ... cannot revive a debate
already concluded ... nor should they refer to debates of the current session ... even if
such reference is relevant, as it tends to reopen matters already decided. At the
same time, I do not wish to unduly restrict the senator from raising a matter which is
important to her. I would suggest, therefore, if the senator is agreeable, that she
reconsider her notice of inquiry, and rephrase it in more general terms so as to minimize
any specific reference to the proceedings on Bill C-68.
Senator Cools: Honourable
senators, I would be happy to rephrase the inquiry. However, it was my clear understanding
that inquiries request no conclusion of the Senate; they are largely instruments of
exchange. Perhaps His Honour can suggest for me a better articulation?
The Hon. the Speaker: I am
afraid I could not do that now, but I would be prepared to discuss the matter with the
honourable senator outside of the Chamber. The facts are that even an inquiry would
be resuming debate on an issue which has already been settled, and that is against the
rules.
Senator Cools: In any event, as
I said before, if it is the wish of the chamber that I re-articulate the inquiry, I will
do that.
Senator Kinsella: Let us hear
your speech.
The Hon. the Speaker:
Honourable Senator Cools, if you are asking leave of the Senate to proceed in this way, of
course, any senator can do that. That is not for me to decide. Are you asking for
leave to proceed with the order as it is structured?
Senator Cools: Yes.
The Hon. the Speaker: Is leave
granted, honourable senators?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
Senator Cools: Honourable
senators, as I was about to say, the intention of my inquiry today is to call attention to
what I had intended to say last week. Honourable senators, spousal violence is an
age-old problem. Men and women connected by sexual relationships, upon the breakdown
of those relationships, are known to inflict hurt on each other. Some even kill one
another. Folk music is dotted with examples. The famous folk song
"Frankie and Johnny" relates an experience of lovers and of lethal violence.
Frankie and Johnny were lovers,
Oh, Lordy, how they could love.
They swore to be true to each other...
Johnny went by, 'bout an hour ago,
With a girl named Nellie Blye...
Frankie got out at South Clark Street,
Looked in a window so high
Saw her Johnny man a-lovin' up
That high brown Nellie Blye...
But Frankie took aim with her pistol
And the gun went root-a-toot-toot.
He was her man, but he done her wrong.
She, Frankie, shot Johnny dead.
Honourable senators, the Minister of Justice, the Honourable Allan Rock, holds that
spousal and domestic violence is a major reason for this initiative, Bill C-68. Mr. Rock
told the Ontario Women's Liberal Commission on April 12, 1995: There are women who
are at risk in their homes and police didn't have the information or the tools to protect
them. On other occasions, he has maintained that the firearms issue is a women's
issue. The Honourable Sheila Finestone, Secretary of State for the Status of Women,
agreed. In a news release of December 6, 1994, Mrs. Finestone stated: "Firearms
control is a life-and-death issue for women in Canada." Feminist groups
repeatedly told the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs that
women live in a constant state of threat and fear of death inflicted by men with firearms
in their homes, and that children live in a constant state of threat and fear of death
inflicted by men with firearms in their homes. Honourable senators, domestic violence is
insufficiently understood. We are just now beginning to gain some comprehension of the
terrible tragedy of spousal violence. Comprehension is also required of feminine
aggression. Family violence is deeply troubling. My life's work has been in the area of
spousal and family violence. In many relationships, there are tangles of pathologies,
coercive patterns and numerous dynamics which reinforce one another. Many gender feminists
interchange the term "domestic violence" with "domestic homicide."
This is not a true picture. Most spousal violence will never reach the state of spousal
killing. The essential element that must be present if spousal conflict is to become
spousal homicide is murderous intent. I have seen several relationships where murderous
intent was present. Often, couples do not recognize its presence, and have no insight into
its workings. Murderous intent is the key element. When present, there is a probability
that the situation could escalate to spousal killing, but spousal abuse has no escalating
spectrum. A spousal slap does not inevitably become a spousal homicide. Common
spousal abuse is a different social problem from spousal homicide. Spousal homicide
remains a largely misunderstood and tragic social program. Some bold initiatives are
required to probe the darkness that lurks in violence, sexual interaction and impulses to
hurt and to kill. Honourable senators, I am disquieted that much testimony before
the Senate committee was either incorrect, inadequate, misstated, manipulated, exaggerated
or loaded as a gender issue. Some confounded the issues. Their techniques include playing
with percentages and combining the unrelated, and are obvious to those knowledgeable in
the field. Honourable senators, various feminist groups appeared before the
committee to support Bill C-68. Ms Arlene Chapman of the Alberta Council of Women's
Shelters insisted that: Almost half of the women killed by their husbands are shot.
Ms Jill Hightower of the B.C. Institute on Family Violence stated that:
Front-line transition house staff report that women are frequently threatened by
their partners, and many of these threats involve firearms. Ms Virginia Fisher
of the Provincial Association of Transition Houses Saskatchewan said that "...46 per
cent of women killed by their husbands are killed with guns" and that, "There
are 50,000 women living in households with guns who feel their lives to be in
danger." When asked about the number of women served by them who have been
killed by husbands using firearms, they declined to give numbers, stating such reasons as,
"I do not have that figure off the top of my head" or "We do not have
funding to do follow-up work on what happens to women after they leave the shelter."
These individuals never supply hard, precise or accurate data to support their assertions
because supporting data does not exist. Further, most of these individuals
know little about spousal homicide. Spousal homicide is a terrible occurrence, the
understanding and treatment of which eludes most agencies and helping professionals.
Moreover, the data collection mechanism at many shelters is indeed questionable, since
many shelters view data collection and research compilation as male-dominated
preoccupations. Many gender feminists are resistant to scientific inquiry and
investigation. Moreover, imagination and fantasy have resulted in profit and
lucrativeness, rather than reason. Some gender feminists told the Senate committee
that children are at risk of abuse with firearms in the home. I note that among the
numerous witnesses before the committee, there was not one witness from child protection
agencies or children's aid societies. I spoke to child protection agency officials in
Toronto. Metro Toronto's Children's Aid Society, the largest children's aid society in
Canada, informed me that they have no concern that children in Metro Toronto are at risk
of abuse with firearms in the home. I spoke to executive director Bruce Rivers. If
children were at risk, child protection agencies would have been active in appearing
before the Senate committee. I also observed that not a single witness appeared from
community crime prevention agencies in Toronto, and I also note that not one witness was
black. The illicit use of firearms by certain black criminals in Toronto is commanding
attention and intervention. The frolics and caprices with data and statistics were
revealed when one particular witness, Dr. Katherine Leonard, gave testimony stretching
credulity and scientific inquiry. On conclusion of her testimony, another witness, Dr.
Judith Ross, herself a psychologist and a target shooter, overheard Dr. Leonard say to
someone, "How did you like the science fiction?" Dr. Ross, on September 27,
1995, wrote to me as follows: "I find it appalling and disgraceful that a
witness at a Senate committee would knowingly present material that was a fiction cloaked
in a pretence of scientific validity." I read Dr. Leonard's testimony. I
pondered about the reliance on such testimony by any minister of the Crown.
Honourable senators, certain gender feminists insist that firearms are a gender issue;
that firearms are a vehicle for male violence and aggression. Central to the belief system
of radical gender feminism is the maxim that firearms constitute the phallic symbol of
male violence, and are symbols of the patriarchal society. In a patriarchal and
heterosexist society, the allowance of guns is a sign of misogyny. Honourable
senators, this is patriarchal nonsense; it is patriarchal rubbish, and supports the notion
that women should live in fear and trembling, not only of men but of men's instruments -
guns. Needless to say, they view heterosexuality as an oppressive state for women.
Gender feminist theory is an example of intellectual fraudulence and is a
theory based on phylogeny, tribadism and misandry. This theory currently stalks the social
and political life of this country. It is predatory, and seeks to dominate and terrorize.
It is a personality disorder in the body politic of this nation. During the
Senate committee hearings on Bill C-68, the Manitoba Attorney General, the Honourable
Rosemary Vodrey, testified. I asked her: I should just like to know how many wives
were killed by husbands in your province last year by firearms, and how many children in
your province alone? She replied: I can just tell you women on homicides
by firearms. I gather the figure is zero. Ms Vodrey gave more detail. She said:
The statistics I have are for 1994, and they relate to deaths due to domestic
violence: Three by stabbing; three by strangulation; two by beating; one by asphyxiation;
none by firearms. Honourable senators, it is no simple task to identify the actual
and precise number of women killed by spouses using firearms. I have studied this question
using Statistics Canada's published data on homicides. In 1994, the actual number of women
killed with firearms by conjugal intimates was 23. I repeat: The precise number of women
killed by spouses using firearms was 23. Statistics Canada defines "conjugal
intimates" as including spouses -legal, common-law, separated, divorced - boyfriends,
extramarital lovers or estranged lovers. Neither feminist groups nor the Minister of
Justice have placed the number of 23 on the table in this debate. I am unsympathetic to
the act of toying with or exaggerating the true numbers. Please be clear that
Minister Vodrey's answer that no woman in her province had been killed by the use of a
firearm in a conjugal-intimate relationship in 1994 surprised the committee. In
1994, the actual number of children under the age of 12 years killed with firearms by a
parent was two. The favoured weapon of murder in Canada is bare hands and feet - the human
body. For example, in 1994, 27 babies under 12 months of age were killed, most with bare
hands. In 1994, the total number of homicides was 596, of which 196 were by the use of
firearms. Of these 196 with firearms, 157 of the victims were men and 39 were women.
Consistently, more men are killed with firearms than women; in fact, four times as many.
The tragedy of domestic homicide is too horrific to be trivialized by numerical
manipulation. Honourable senators, in the murders of three teenaged girls in
Toronto, Karla Homolka and Paul Bernardo used their hands, the favoured weapon of murder.
The brutal absurdity of this discussion was made manifest at the Homolka trial. The Crown
and the judge significantly forgave Ms Homolka in relation to two murders, and totally
forgave her in relation to her sister's murder, and gave her a 12-year sentence. As part
of her 12-year sentence for killing with her hands, Mr. Justice Kovacs imposed an order
prohibiting Homolka from possessing a firearm. Honourable senators, time does not
permit me to speak to the extraordinary measures of this bill. Millions of men and women
in this country come from cultural backgrounds of hunting, target practice, marksmanship
and precision shooting. This heritage of marksmanship is a Canadian phenomenon. Young
people learned to shoot from their parents as part of their heritage. Canada's World War I
hero, Billy Bishop, learned to shoot as a boy in Owen Sound, Ontario, with a rifle given
to him for Christmas by his father. It is a similar situation for young women. Linda Thom,
at age 8, learned to shoot with her father. She won a gold medal in the 1984 Olympic
Games. In gun sports, men and women compete as equals. There is even a group of women
shooters called the "Gun Grannies." Canada's heritage of marksmanship and
mastery of the instruments of force is legendary. In 1914 and in 1939, the Canadian
military met its responsibility. The marksmanship training of many Canadians by various
rifle and gun associations assisted Canada's wartime efforts. A proud example is the
Dominion of Canada Rifle Association, founded in 1868, which has trained generations of
Canadians in the responsible use and care of firearms. Canadians consistently win
international competitions. Those who engage in the recreational and economic use of
firearms are persons who are law-abiding citizens, who abhor the illegal and illicit use
of firearms. They see that crime and the illegal use of firearms bedevils Canada's big
cities, especially Toronto. In Toronto, aggressive and successful initiatives are required
in the area of crime prevention, including initiatives in law enforcement, criminal
judicial processes, plea bargaining, sentencing and, most important, in race relations, to
solve Toronto's enormous crime problems.
The Hon. the Speaker:
Honourable Senator Cools, I am sorry to interrupt, but your time has expired.
Senator Cools: Honourable
senators, I need exactly one minute or so to complete my remarks. I would be happy to have
leave to continue.
The Hon. the Speaker: Is leave
granted, honourable senators?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
Senator Cools: These
law-abiding citizens feel violated when they are likened to criminals because of the mere
possession of their firearms or, worse, they are criminalized. Moreover, they resist the
persistent invasiveness of governments into their lives. In fact, they view the
government's initiative, Bill C-68, as creating a thought process which some will promote
as the new Canadian morality: to wit, firearms are inherently evil and so are their
owners. I note how conveniently this concept falls into the gender feminists' maxim
that men are harmful to women, and that all firearms are symptomatic of this harmfulness
and should be discouraged and, ultimately, destroyed. Legitimate gun owners believe that
when firearms are outlawed by governments, only outlaws will have firearms.
Honourable senators, gender feminist theory based on the innate evil of men and the innate
virtue of women is seriously flawed. Social policy based on flawed theory is flawed social
policy. Legislation based on flawed social policy is flawed legislation. The
Minister of Justice as a minister of the Crown is no ordinary minister. This minister has
a duty to be less worldly and less obviously political than other ministers. The Minister
of Justice also has a duty to find accommodation among disparate interests.
Honourable senators, I am a senator from Ontario, the former Upper Canada. In the early
1800s in Upper Canada, there was something that was locally known as "stump
law." Stump law was legislation passed by the then Tory government as a compound of
arrogance and force. Liberal reformer members like Dr. William Baldwin were brutalized by
the use of such legislative power. Bill C-68 is reminiscent of old Upper Canadian stump
law. I hope my Inuit colleagues, Senators Willie Adams and Charlie Watt, are not too
damaged. I hope my support of their just cause has brought them a measure of comfort.
The proposition that Bill C-68 addresses the problem of domestic violence, that it
is a bill to protect women, is not supported by the information put before the Senate. The
premise and foundation for Bill C-68, we are told, is the good of women. Those who attempt
to demonstrate this do so insufficiently. In fact, the research points in a different
direction. Honourable senators, I reject the premise that firearms ownership and use
is a women's issue. This bill is begging for amendment. Since my side will accept no
amendments, I am prepared to support the amendments to Bill C-68 as put forward in the
committee's report, and by Senator Sparrow. Honourable senators, that was the speech
I had prepared and was quite ready, willing and able to deliver last week. I thank you for
your indulgence, and for the opportunity to have made my speech. For myself, I would have
found it somewhat discomfiting and a little disquieting not to have had the opportunity to
give my speech, to the extent that I had put time and trouble into composing it. I
should also like to say, honourable senators, that I look forward to an opportunity when I
can rise and speak uninterrupted in the Senate. It seems to be a very difficult
proposition for me to do so in this chamber.
The Hon. the Speaker:
Honourable senators, if no other senator wishes to speak, this inquiry is considered
debated.
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