Liberals limit remaining debate on gun control bill

The federal government passed a motion late Tuesday limiting how much time MPs have left to consider changes and debate Liberal gun control legislation Bill C-21 before it is sent to the Senate for a second round of scrutiny.

The federal government passed a motion late Tuesday limiting how much time MPs have left to consider changes and debate Liberal gun control legislation Bill C-21 before it is sent to the Senate for a second round of scrutiny.

Through what's known as a programming motion, the Liberals—with votes from NDP and Bloc Quebecois MPs— have set in stone the remainder of House of Commons' plans related to this bill. 

The motion passing means that now:

This move from Government House Leader Mark Holland, on a piece of legislation that has now been before the House for almost a year, came just one week after Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino put forward a series of revised amendments that seek to significantly expand the range of proposed gun control measures in the bill. 

Among the most significant changes was to insert a prospective Criminal Code "technical definition" of what constitutes a prohibited assault-style firearm, meant to "cement in law" a permanent ban on future models.

The minister's rethink came after withdrawing an initial amendment package that sparked considerable backlash last fall, largely due to trying to inject an "evergreen" definition for assault-style weapons that would have prohibited hundreds of gun models currently on the market, including some commonly used for sport and hunting. Since pulling the plug on the problematic proposals in February, the legislation had largely been languishing.

MPs on the House Public Safety and National Security Committee have over the last week and a half have been working through the Liberals’ latest amendment package, as well as more than 100 other proposed amendments to Bill C-21. So far they’ve been able to make it through 10 of 73 clauses of the legislation.