Northern Ontario firearms owners, advocates hope for change this federal election

Voters in northern Ontario say the political parties' stances on firearms are a key federal election issue in the region and hope for change after Monday's vote.

John Kaplanis said many gun owners are frustrated with pervasive gun crime despite the federal government's controversial overhaul of firearms legislation, Bill C-21. 

He said he felt the government's firearms restrictions have been ineffective at reducing gun violence while creating headaches for law-abiding firearms owners. 

"I certainly rank this as a No. 1 voting concern for me," said Kaplanis, executive director with the Northwestern Ontario Sportsmen's Alliance.

"Canada has a lot of northern communities, a lot of remote communities that rely on a wide variety of different firearm types to procure food to protect their property and their farms and their livestock."

While he was prime minister, Justin Trudeau's cabinet introduced a "freeze" on the sale, purchase and transfer of handguns in 2022 after a spate of violent gun crime and the 2020 mass shooting in Portapique, N.S. 

As proposed changes to Bill C-21 were introduced, hunting rifles and shotguns were swept up into the ban list. In response to criticism, the government said it did not intend to ban firearms primarily used for hunting and would review the list. 

The fallout was a significant loss of the trust of firearms owners, said Kaplanis. 

"A lot of the firearms that were promised that wouldn't be banned in the past 10 years have been banned. So I think it's safe to expect that firearms that we currently own lawfully can be seen in future bans," he said. 

Many gun owners fear electing another Liberal government could result in hunting rifles eventually being banned, said Doug Johnson, president of the Thunder Bay Fish and Game Association, 

"I honestly believe that they're going to come after all firearms eventually, so that'll mean nobody will be able to hunt anymore." 

If that were to happen, northern Ontario's economy and way of life could be impacted, said Johnson. 

"It [would be] a big financial loss to the whole area because there's lots of outfitters that rely on people coming here to hunt bears, and moose and deer. A lot of people rely on that for part of their life, their subsistence too." 

Johnson would like to see the Firearms Act reworked and the classification system re-evaluated to ensure hunting rifles aren't swept up in bans on "assault-style" weapons.