Yukon Justice Minister Laura Lang says Ottawa should scrap its assault-style firearms prohibition after the federal government extended an amnesty period for firearm owners while a legal challenge heads to the Supreme Court of Canada.<\/p>\n
The federal government has extended the amnesty orders until 90 days after the Supreme Court rules on the validity of the 2020 regulations. The extension means owners and businesses with affected firearms are protected from criminal liability while the court case continues.<\/p>\n
The Supreme Court is expected to hear the challenge in 2027.<\/p>\n
The prohibition stems from federal regulations introduced May 1, 2020, that added more than 1,500 previously legal firearms to the prohibited list. Ottawa described them as \u201cassault-style firearms\u201d. Additional firearms were added in 2024 and 2025, bringing the total to more than 2,500 makes and models. <\/p>\n
The policy has faced sharp criticism from firearm owners, police organizations and political opponents, who say it targets licensed owners while doing too little to address illegal firearms and gun crime.<\/p>\n
The National Police Federation, which represents more than 20,000 RCMP officers, criticized the federal approach in a November 2020 position statement. The federation said measures aimed at legal firearm owners risk draining police resources from efforts to address illegal firearms, gang crime and cross-border smuggling.<\/p>\n
The federation said the policy \u201cdiverts extremely important personnel, resources, and funding away from addressing the more immediate and growing threat of criminal use of illegal firearms.\u201d It also said Canada lacked reliable data on the origins of firearms used in crimes.<\/p>\n
Several provincial and territorial governments have also opposed the federal program. Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario and Yukon have said they will not use provincial or territorial policing resources to enforce mandatory firearm surrenders. Alberta, Saskatchewan and Ontario have also joined the legal challenge led by the Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights.<\/p>\n
Lang told the News in a phone interview that she welcomed the extension and supports the provinces pursuing the court challenge.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think this is a really terrific opportunity for Canada to take time to really reflect on how this program was created, which in our opinion was poorly thought out and misguided,\u201d Lang said.<\/p>\n
Lang issued a statement in January opposing the federal program, but said Yukon does not plan to join the court case.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith any challenge we look at what we actually bring to the table that is unique,\u201d Lang said. \u201cOur colleagues in the provinces beat us to that and they\u2019re doing a great job, so while we are very interested and keen to see those efforts pursued, we don\u2019t see the need to step in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lang said some of the prohibited firearms are used by Yukoners for hunting, subsistence living and life on the land.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome of these firearms are used for our northern way of life, largely for hunting on the land and subsistence living, and those are firearms we would like to see continue to be used by Yukoners,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Asked about Ottawa\u2019s position that the prohibition will help combat gun crime, Lang said the firearms listed in the ban are not generally used in criminal activity in Yukon or across Canada.<\/p>\n
National data on firearms used in crimes remains limited.<\/p>\n
According to internal RCMP documents reported by The Canadian Press on June 11, the RCMP completed 6,951 firearm traces in 2024. Of those traces, 4,197 were linked to a crime and 2,814 were traced to a source.<\/p>\n
Those figures do not show how many of the traced firearms were assault-style firearms covered by the federal prohibition. They also do not provide a complete picture of firearms used in crimes, because not every firearm used in a crime is recovered, submitted for tracing or successfully traced.<\/p>\n
Statistics Canada reported more than 14,000 firearm-related violent crimes in 2024, but the RCMP tracing data cannot be directly compared with that total. A trace is an investigative process used on a recovered firearm. It does not represent every firearm-related crime reported to police.<\/p>\n
The available figures also show the difficulty in measuring whether the federal prohibition targets the firearms most often used in crime. Of the 2,814 crime guns the RCMP traced to a source in 2024, 29 per cent were handguns, according to the documents reported by The Canadian Press. Handguns are regulated separately and are not the focus of the assault-style firearms prohibition.<\/p>\n
The data does not establish how many firearms covered by the assault-style firearms ban were used in crimes. It also does not show whether firearms that could not be traced were legally owned, illegally imported, stolen or otherwise obtained.<\/p>\n
Lang said that lack of clear data is part of the problem.<\/p>\n
She said Yukon wants to see a firearms policy that reflects northern realities, including hunting and subsistence use, while putting more emphasis on prevention, education and responsible ownership.<\/p>\n
Lang said gun violence should be addressed through measures \u201clargely focused on prevention, education, and increased awareness of what it means to be a good firearms owner.\u201d<\/p>\n
The federal government has defended the prohibition, saying assault-style firearms pose a risk to public safety and should be removed from communities. Ottawa has also said its broader firearms strategy includes border enforcement, anti-smuggling measures and programs aimed at gun and gang violence.<\/p>\n
The federal Assault-Style Firearms Compensation Program is expected to continue despite the amnesty extension. The government says the new amnesty expiry date does not affect the compensation program, which is expected to wrap up by October 2026.<\/p>\n
Under the amnesty orders, affected owners remain protected from criminal liability while they take steps to comply with the law. The federal government says owners who do not participate in the compensation program must still dispose of prohibited firearms before the amnesty period ends.<\/p>\n
The Supreme Court case centres on the federal government\u2019s authority to prohibit firearms through regulations under the Criminal Code. The regulations have been challenged by licensed firearm owners, hunters, sport shooters, firearms businesses, shooting clubs and the Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights.<\/p>\n
The Federal Court dismissed the challenge in 2023. The Federal Court of Appeal dismissed consolidated appeals in 2025. The Supreme Court granted leave to appeal in March 2026.<\/p>\n
Contact Noah Korver at noah.korver@yukon-news.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Yukon Justice Minister Laura Lang says Ottawa should scrap its assault-style firearms prohibition after the federal government extended…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":733670,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194295],"tags":[49,48,20739],"class_list":["post-733669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ottawa","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-ottawa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=733669"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733669\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/733670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}