December 03,  2004

Wasteful spending by Liberals

supported by Bloc and NDP

( Ottawa )  On November 29^th, during a meeting of the Standing Committee of Justice, the Liberals, Bloc Québécois, and NDP joined together to vote down a Conservative motion that would have cut $20 million in wasteful spending from the firearms registry.

Inky Mark, Conservative Member of Parliament commented, “Despite Liberal promises to cap spending on the registry, their own numbers show the costs are $1.4 billion, while a report prepared by a Radio-Canada news program suggests the cost of the gun registry program is approaching $2 billion – double the previous estimates.”

“Based on the average income tax paid by Canadians, $2 billion wasted on the failed registry represents 3 years of taxes for the almost 77, 000 constituents in my riding.”

The $2 billion for the registry could have been spent on:

·         8 years of salary for 4,444 new police officers (An average salary of $56,250 per year over the first 8 years)

·         An annual salary of about 1,646 Manitoba nurses for 25 years. (Maximum salary $48,599)

·         500 installed MRIs (the cost of an MRI with installation being $4 million)

·         Every university student in the province could have been given a bursary to fund his or her education, amounting to $95,771.68 per student.

·         Over 4 years of total drug expenditures in Manitoba . ($427 million were spent on drugs in Manitoba in 1999)

“The negligence of the Liberal government has cost Canadians approximately $2 billion – and the costs continue to grow.  The NDP and Bloc continue to support this careless spending.  It’s time the Liberals admit they made a mistake and scrap the registry.  The money they are wasting could be better utilized than targeting law-abiding gun owners,” Mark concluded.