The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - Bad idea “buyback” gun grab.

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome once again to The Blueprints. This is Canada's Conservative Podcast. I'm your

00:00:13.260 host, Jamie Schmael, Member of Parliament for Halliburton Corps of the Lakes, with new content

00:00:16.960 for you every single Tuesday, 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. Don't forget to like, comment, subscribe,

00:00:21.800 and share this program. Tell your friends they can download it on platforms like CastBox,

00:00:25.940 iTunes, Google Play, and Spotify. You name it, it is out there. On today's show, the Liberal Firearms

00:00:31.560 Confiscation Program fails miserably in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, but they're moving it nationally as

00:00:37.960 well. The Liberals seem to fail upwards to talk about this and so much else. We bring on Bob Zimmer. He's

00:00:44.000 the Member of Parliament for Prince George, Peace River, and Northern Rockies, also the co-chair

00:00:48.940 of the All-Party Parliamentary Outdoor Caucus. Thanks for coming on the show. Thanks for having me again,

00:00:53.860 Jamie. It's good to be here. Good to be back. Unfortunately, it's about the same topic.

00:00:57.000 Yes. We keep litigating. Sadly, it just keeps going, doesn't it? The Liberals are just after the

00:01:01.560 law-abiding, licensed firearms owners again and again. Right. But they've done everything right.

00:01:11.400 I can understand why people want the shootings happening. Yeah, absolutely. Not all in urban

00:01:17.420 centres, but across Canada. They want them to stop. I do too. We all do. Right. Yeah, absolutely.

00:01:21.640 We all do. They're going about it wrong, as the headline says.

00:01:25.140 Yeah. Well, and one statistic that's from Gary Mauser, he's a former professor at Simon Fraser

00:01:30.800 University. This is from one of his articles. Between 2000 and 2020, an average of 12 PAL holders,

00:01:37.980 that's firearms license holders, per year were accused of homicide out of approximately 2 million

00:01:43.600 PAL holders. During that same 10-year period, the PAL holder firearms homicide rate was 0.63 per

00:01:50.860 100,000 firearms license holders, compared to 0.72 per 100,000 adult Canadians. That's 14% higher

00:02:00.180 than the rate for PAL holders. So what that says is that law-abiding firearms owners, they're not just

00:02:05.800 as safe as the average Canadian. They're actually safer.

00:02:08.360 They're safer. Yeah. I think proof is also- More law-abiding.

00:02:12.200 Yes, absolutely. Especially if you have a restricted firearms license, which allows you to, I guess,

00:02:17.480 possess a handgun now, you can't buy them or trade them. Your name is run through the police data bank

00:02:23.260 every single day. It's like being on parole every single day of your life.

00:02:27.360 Absolutely. So that's what we've said, and our leader, Pierre Poliev, has done a great job of just

00:02:32.320 logically explaining that to Canadians. We're winning on that. Most Canadians, you see it from 0.69

00:02:37.700 province to province to province, where they're pushing back on this because it doesn't make sense.

00:02:41.800 They're going to spend, right now, they're at about $746 million, and some quotes as high as $6 billion,

00:02:49.420 and I think it's even potentially going to be higher.

00:02:52.180 Wow. So liberals do. 0.97

00:02:53.600 While not doing anything to really change shootings in downtown Toronto.

00:02:58.200 Yeah. That's the thing, right? What is the outcome? What is the planned result other than

00:03:03.520 just taking away everyone's fire?

00:03:05.580 Right. Except the criminals.

00:03:07.180 Absolutely. So that's the problem that we see, too, is, you know, here you're, you know,

00:03:12.360 I think every mother, like I have four children, and I know you have kids. We all want to see safer

00:03:19.300 streets for our families and their families, right? We all want to see that. But when the government is

00:03:25.120 spending so much of their efforts and using so many police resources, as we just heard in the INN

00:03:29.620 Committee many times, Jamie, is that the resources, police already are lacking the resources to tackle

00:03:36.920 crime, and they're going to be asked now to use their resources to go after law-abiding firearms

00:03:41.380 owners' firearms. It's ridiculous. It's backwards, and we wish the government would focus on what 0.97

00:03:45.880 the real problem is, and that's illegal firearms getting in the hands of criminals and killing kids

00:03:50.480 on our streets.

00:03:51.480 Yeah, exactly. Well, I find it also interesting that the crowd that doesn't seem to like the police

00:03:56.500 very much now wants them to carry out their bidding in terms of, yeah, going out to law-abiding

00:04:01.300 firearms. So let's hit the other headline here, because the program did go ahead as a pilot in

00:04:08.020 Nova Scotia. You have some numbers on this.

00:04:10.660 Yeah. So tell us about these. How many firearms did they get? What was the cost? Tell us that.

00:04:15.140 So this is right from CBC. Cape Breton Police prepared to start firearm buyback pilot project

00:04:20.300 program, and it went on to actually announce what it was going to fund this. So the federal

00:04:27.260 government, this is right from the article, the federal government is paying the Cape Breton Police

00:04:31.580 Service $103,000 to administer the pilot project. Now, that's what they're paying. We don't know what

00:04:36.860 the final number is. And what we found out was they only collected 22 firearms, and we just did the math.

00:04:43.180 Per firearm, that's $4,681 per firearm collected.

00:04:50.060 That will not make anyone any safer.

00:04:51.740 No.

00:04:52.140 Any community better off in terms of avoiding shootings or gang activity.

00:04:56.140 Right.

00:04:56.540 None of that.

00:04:57.180 And I've actually argued it makes us more unsafe, because that same police force that really should

00:05:01.100 be tackling crime is now distracted by this new program that they're being directed to perform,

00:05:08.300 and this gun confiscation by the Prime Minister Mark Carney.

00:05:11.180 Yeah.

00:05:11.580 So it actually, I think, in many ways makes us more unsafe.

00:05:14.380 Let's queue up cut one here. We have, of course, the Public Safety Minister talking about

00:05:18.780 how the program is apparently voluntary. Apparently.

00:05:21.660 Funny.

00:05:22.300 Play cut one.

00:05:23.580 During the election campaign, we committed to moving ahead with implementing an efficient

00:05:29.020 gun buyback program for assault-style firearms, such as the AR-15s. Today, we're here to talk about

00:05:36.620 our government's next steps in making good on that promise to Canadians. The assault-style firearms

00:05:43.820 compensation program provides a way for firearm owners to safely dispose of and or deactivate

00:05:51.660 their assault-style firearm and receive compensation in return. This program is voluntary. Nobody's having

00:05:59.100 their weapon confiscated.

00:06:01.500 Does anyone believe that? You're told to bring it in. If you don't, some things might happen,

00:06:06.140 but hey, it's voluntary.

00:06:07.420 Right. Well, we had the ministering committee, and we asked them that exact question, or I did.

00:06:11.660 And I asked about, you know, whether this program is voluntary. And it's only voluntary

00:06:16.540 if you stop to give the firearm back or you have to decommission it, but you have to do it. I said,

00:06:22.860 well, voluntary actually means that what if you choose not to?

00:06:25.500 Right. Exactly.

00:06:26.140 That's what really voluntary means. So we all know this isn't voluntary. It's a gun

00:06:30.780 confiscation scheme by the federal government. And just because they call it voluntary doesn't make

00:06:36.220 it voluntary.

00:06:36.860 No, exactly. And that's the key of it all, right? We're still waiting for the outcome. What

00:06:43.020 is the outcome? Safer streets? Probably not. You know, like, here's, let's cut two. We have

00:06:47.740 another cut, again, with the public safety minister going on about the voluntary program.

00:06:52.700 Blake, cut two.

00:06:53.340 For a gun backpack, sir, is there a next step for you if this government does not engage

00:06:59.660 or walks away from anybody? We will continue to work with all the provinces and territories,

00:07:05.980 as well as law enforcement, to ensure that the compensation program is implemented in an equitable

00:07:12.220 way. For any jurisdictions that are preventing the compensation program to move forward, they're

00:07:17.660 really hurting their own citizens. As you're aware, there are funds available as part of the

00:07:25.500 program for individual firearms owners who have prohibited weapons from getting compensation. So

00:07:31.660 if they're disallowing their citizens to attain that compensation, they're really hurting their own

00:07:36.460 people. So in this clip, the public safety minister was talking about the reluctance of some

00:07:40.940 provinces to jump on board this problem, this, this, the federal scheme to disarm law-abiding

00:07:46.780 firearms owners. And, and the provinces, some of them have said, no, we're not right. We got better

00:07:51.180 things to do, basically is what they said, right? To your point earlier. Yeah. So I find it interesting

00:07:56.380 use of language by the public safety minister about hurting its own citizens. Right. How?

00:08:02.620 Yeah. Well, it's quite the opposite because we heard even just at I-9 committee for the last,

00:08:07.340 I think several weeks. And we asked, uh, various police chiefs, various of first nations, uh,

00:08:13.900 communities, um, and chiefs of first nation communities. And, and without almost exception,

00:08:19.900 I think there was one chief that said otherwise was that they do not want to waste police resources

00:08:25.100 that are already very sparse. They're already not dealing with the crimes in community. Now they do

00:08:29.980 not want to use those sparse resources to go after law abiding first nations and Inuit firearms owners. 0.94

00:08:36.700 And some are saying we're not going to do it. And you've seen even the past, uh, a couple of weeks

00:08:42.140 and months where Saskatchewan has said, we're not going to do it, participate in the federal program.

00:08:46.540 Alberta has said the same. And I think Ontario has given signals to that effect as well. And, and I think

00:08:52.540 the, the bottom line of it all is because it's not going to work and that's what they see. It just isn't

00:08:57.260 going to work. So why would they spend those resources on something that isn't going to work?

00:09:00.700 Exactly. Doesn't make sense. No, it doesn't. Especially when recruitment's down for policing,

00:09:05.100 to your point earlier, they're, they're having a tough time filling the, responding to the calls

00:09:09.820 that need to be responded. They don't need to be creating more work that will solve no crime,

00:09:14.380 that will solve the, the, the, the increase in gang activity, et cetera, et cetera. So cue up cut three.

00:09:20.460 Now we have a liberal MP. She does have some provost. Yeah. That's her. Okay.

00:09:25.260 Yeah. She does have some personal trauma. Um, so she, she's not a huge fan of firearms in general.

00:09:31.820 Right. Um, so, but, but her response to this question was very interesting play cut three.

00:09:37.500 All of the people in possession of, uh, of one of the weapon that has been banned since 2020,

00:09:44.540 and will not participate in the compensation program will, will have an illegal gun in its position.

00:09:52.140 And that's a criminal act. All right. Thank you very much.

00:09:55.100 So that's what I find, find interesting. So right now we have these illegal firearms that are smuggled

00:10:00.460 across the border that are making their way into the hands of criminals and they're using them. And

00:10:06.060 there's lots of video evidence to show the shootings that are going up. And it's quite scary considering

00:10:11.820 this never used to be a massive issue. Um, so now she's saying we will buy back, confiscate

00:10:19.260 these firearms that are on the list and, and anyone that doesn't comply will then have an illegal firearm.

00:10:26.460 So like she's making more criminals, the government's making more criminals of law abiding 1.00

00:10:33.340 citizens. Are they actually going to act on that as well? Maybe they'll probably act on that and just

00:10:37.740 ignore the, the, the, the criminals that are rampaging our communities.

00:10:41.260 Well, I'll ask you a question, Jamie, what she just said there, does it sound like a voluntary

00:10:44.780 program?

00:10:45.180 Yeah, that's right. If you don't, that's true. That's actually a good point. If you don't do it,

00:10:49.340 you're a criminal. 0.89

00:10:49.900 Right. And the minister just said in the previous clips that it was, uh, it was a voluntary program.

00:10:54.780 And she, uh, said quite the opposite. And I think we all know what the government's intent is

00:11:00.380 and it really isn't a voluntary program, but they're trying. And again, uh, the pushback is, uh,

00:11:05.180 warranted by, uh, provincial governments. They're seeing that it just isn't going to work. And

00:11:09.420 again, we we've seen it firsthand from, uh, you know, from police forces across the country that

00:11:14.300 have really said, look, um, we'd rather go after the bad guys instead of the good guys. Again,

00:11:19.020 we've just said statistically that, uh, a licensed firearms holder in Canada is safer than the average

00:11:25.100 Canadian. So why would then resources be spent to take away those, uh, law abiding Canadians firearms?

00:11:31.020 It doesn't make sense. No. And I think, uh, a good point of that is, uh, your writing and my writing,

00:11:36.380 right? I would say there are a very high number of legal, responsible, licensed, trained firearms

00:11:44.700 owners. And our writings would be a, you know, a war zone. Right. If, if your true stats were untrue,

00:11:51.820 right? Like, right. And what's happening, we're actually seeing this because of the rise in crime.

00:11:57.100 It's the criminals now are, we're seeing set up shop because of other issues around

00:12:01.740 safe supply and other drug issues and, and, uh, this, uh, revolving door of, uh, you know, uh,

00:12:08.140 bail, not, uh, jail. Uh, we're seeing crime increase, but it's not from legal firearms. It's,

00:12:13.820 it's, it's all from the illegal criminal activity. That's right. Let's, let's address the real issue

00:12:18.220 is the criminal not come up with some scheme to give the illusion. They're actually doing something,

00:12:22.940 but really nothing's going to change while wasting billions in the process. Right. And

00:12:26.700 we know, uh, you know, the term that, that I created was grandpa Joe. And, uh, you know,

00:12:32.300 this is somebody that everybody has a grandpa that's hunted maybe as a firearm. They might

00:12:36.220 not have one themselves, but they don't want grandpa Joe or, or, uh, you know, you know,

00:12:41.660 grandma Jane to be affected by this particular law to take away their farms. They've been the greatest 1.00

00:12:46.860 citizens, taxpayers for many years. All they want to do is be able to go and hunt once a year and 0.59

00:12:52.380 and keep their firearms. But this government wants to take their farms away. And it's sad.

00:12:55.900 It is very sad, especially if you go two steps ahead too, right? Like there are people hunting,

00:13:00.700 groceries are insanely expensive. Like I believe, uh, this is in 2026, people will be paying $900

00:13:08.540 above and beyond what they paid last year. That's above what they pay. It's all compounded, right?

00:13:13.660 So you're talking thousands in the last few years in grocery. So if someone wants to go hunt to fill

00:13:18.380 their freezer and hopefully get them through the season or reduce the grocery bill, you're getting

00:13:22.860 that taken away from you. Absolutely. And then it goes to dependence on government.

00:13:26.620 Right. And it's even more accentuated in the north because food is so expensive in the territories.

00:13:32.060 And, uh, and, and, and people that live in the territories really rely on hunting for sustenance

00:13:37.100 and to provide food for their families. And, uh, this is exceptionally, uh, damaging for northerners.

00:13:43.100 It's absolutely. And, and of course the government loves it when you're dependent on that, right?

00:13:48.380 Instead of looking after yourself, the personal responsibility, which we all enjoyed, we all

00:13:53.340 love and conservatives like to, to promote, um, they're basically taking away another level

00:13:59.820 of that independence and say, don't worry, government will take care of you.

00:14:03.420 Well, and, and I'll speak to this is, uh, I went up to Cambridge Bay, which is in, in Nunavut.

00:14:08.060 Uh, it's on the Northwest Passage and, uh, you know, met with this group, Canadian Rangers,

00:14:13.340 Inuit, uh, uh, people, just great individuals, uh, these beautiful smiles.

00:14:18.540 And I thought, well, the first issue might be something else around national security, maybe.

00:14:22.940 And that was an issue later on. Their number one issue when we spoke was they were concerned

00:14:27.340 that the federal government was going to take away their, their law, their lawfully obtained firearms,

00:14:32.540 and namely the SKS, which is, uh, is all across the North because it's, it's fairly inexpensive

00:14:38.300 to buy. And the ammunition is, is, uh, pretty cheap to buy as well. And they use it for hunting

00:14:42.700 all the time. And so that was the first issue they came to me with concerns around it and warranted as

00:14:47.500 well, because the government really does want to come and take away their hunting firearms.

00:14:51.580 We're pretty much out of time, but as you know, the guests get the last word, maybe you can talk

00:14:55.420 about whatever you want, but maybe you can maybe highlight some of the things that we as conservatives,

00:14:59.820 not only proposed in the last election, but based on the advancements in the liberal agenda,

00:15:05.180 what we're, we're hoping to do to combat what the liberals are up to.

00:15:08.780 Sure. So I'll maybe say this, uh, we had the parliamentary budget officer just at INE committee

00:15:14.220 and I'd asked him a question around firearms, what the total cost of this confiscation plan is going

00:15:19.100 to be. And he said it hadn't been fully costed. He hadn't seen a number where it actually was a total,

00:15:24.860 but this is again from, uh, Gary Mauser. The federal government recently said the program's

00:15:32.060 administrative costs, safe storage, destruction of hundreds of thousands of firearms, et cetera,

00:15:37.020 would reach an estimated $1.8 billion. That's 1.8 billion with a B. This is Gary Mauser's,

00:15:44.540 my estimate based on the similar program in New, my estimate based on a similar program in New Zealand

00:15:50.940 in 2019 is closer to $6 billion just for collection and compensation. So this thing without any other

00:15:59.020 numbers to prove that it's going to be otherwise, uh, and you know how things in Ottawa usually are

00:16:04.460 bigger than what they say. It's not a good sign of things to come and it's not, we don't believe a

00:16:09.660 good use of taxpayer monies to go after the wrong people. Again, we want to tackle, uh, criminals

00:16:15.020 and again, that's our focus. And thankfully we have, we've got a great leader that wants to really

00:16:18.940 tackle what the real issue is. And that's, uh, criminals getting their hands on illegal guns and,

00:16:24.380 uh, you know, hurting our kids. So I appreciate the opportunity again, Jamie, appreciate your support

00:16:29.500 for the law abiding firearms community. And, uh, we'll just keep going. I really appreciate coming

00:16:34.860 on. Someday I'd love to get you here on a different topic. If the liberals would just

00:16:39.740 come to their senses, maybe we won't have to keep re-litigating this over and over again.

00:16:44.460 Well, we hope they do. Yeah, absolutely. Bob Zimmer, thanks for coming on.

00:16:47.580 Thanks for having me. Thank you for your time. Member of Parliament for

00:16:49.580 Prince George, Peace River in Northern Rockies. Also the co-chair

00:16:52.780 for the all-party Parliamentary Outdoor Caucus. Thank you for his time. Thank you for yours.

00:16:58.140 Don't forget we will have new content every single Tuesday, 1.30 p.m. Eastern time. If you're a firearms

00:17:03.100 owner, you know someone who is, please like, comment, subscribe, and share this program

00:17:07.740 and tell them to listen to it on platforms like CastBox, iTunes, Google Play, and Spotify.

00:17:12.380 It's all out there. It's even on YouTube as well. Until next week, remember low taxes,

00:17:16.780 less government, more freedom. That's the blueprint.

The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - January 14, 2026

Bad idea “buyback” gun grab.

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