American “red flag” laws (“punishment now, due process later”) have been opposed for years by groups as varied as the NRA and the ACLU because of their shaky science, minimal evidentiary requirements, and significant erosions of constitutional due process and property rights. Seven years ago, commentators were already warning that the orders weaponized constitutionally protected First and Second Amendment activity into the basis for orders, furnished malicious individuals with a legal means to persecute others, and stripped the gun rights of innocent citizens for imagined future, not actual, offenses.
Canada’s Liberal government, relentlessly pro-gun control and blissfully unconstrained by legal norms, had no problem embracing the concept and, in 2023, introduced new “red flag” orders (Emergency Prohibition Orders and Emergency Limitations on Access Orders) via Bill C-21. A “backgrounder” on the law declared that “[p]rotecting the safety and security of victims of intimate partner violence and gender-based violence is of paramount importance. Victims need to feel protected and fully supported when they ask for help.”
Under the law, anyone may apply for an order. Initial hearings are ex parte (without notice to the affected person, who is not present to respond to the allegations made), and once granted, the orders mandate the revocation of any firearm license and the removal of a person’s firearms, ammunition and “other weapons or associated items” for anywhere between 30 days and five years (for orders of over 30 days’ duration, the person’s firearms, license, and other items “won’t be returned”).
Bill C-21 was presented as part of a comprehensive plan to “keep Canadians safe from gun violence” and, in March, Frank Caputo, a Conservative Member of Parliament, inquired how these orders contributed to public safety and at what cost. His written parliamentary question requested the details of federal government spending “on the ‘Red Flag’ Awareness Initiative 2025 and on other measures promoting the laws” (along with a cost breakdown), the number of “red flag” orders issued since Bill C-21 went into effect, and the total number of firearms obtained or seized by way of these orders.
The response of the Minister of Public Safety was telling, both in what was disclosed and what was not.
As of mid-March, CAD$728,829 had been spent to “raise awareness” of red flag laws, out of a total of CAD$4.8 million committed to the awareness project. In the last two and a half years, though, only a single“red flag” order, in Ontario in 2025, had been reported to the RCMP’s Canadian Firearms Program and recorded in its database. No information was given about that order or the firearms seized, if any: the government-speak the response was couched in advised that categories for seizures “do not provide the level of details necessary to associate a specific firearm to an emergency prohibition order. As a result, the Canadian Firearms Program does not have the information to provide the number of firearm(s) obtained.” Translated into plain English, it seems government records don’t specifically track gun seizures due to “red flag” orders, a peculiar omission if there’s any interest in assessing the purported effectiveness of the new law and the related multi-million dollar investment it has forced on taxpayers.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) confirms that there’s no demonstrated utility in these orders “because no one appears to be keeping track of when, where or how often they are being implemented.” According to the process outlined by Public Safety Canada, courts issuing “red flag” orders are required to inform the regional chief firearms officer of their issuance and any subsequent variations or revocations, all of which must be recorded in the RCMP’s Canadian Firearms Information System, the database used to verify whether a person’s gun license is valid. The CBC’s investigation revealed that the eleven provincial and territorial chief firearms officers (responsible for gun license revocations) had no data on red flag-related seizures, and neither did the Ontario Provincial Police or Sûreté du Québec. As we’ve seen, Public Safety Canada was able to document just one order nationwide. Federal Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree reportedly declined an interview with the CBC and his office advised “it was not in a position to respond to CBC News questions about the data gap.”
One person the CBC did persuade to comment was Christian Leuprecht, a political science professor at the Royal Military College, who summed the situation up perfectly as another example of performative politics:
Much of what we do on gun policy in this country has no grounding in evidence and is all about ideology on the one hand, and about electoral payoff and specific ridings on the other…Usually when government introduces these types of measures, they’re not particularly intended for an effect. They’re intended for a public perception that government wants to be seen as doing something.
For those following events in Canada, this approach is completely consistent with the Liberal government’s stance on lawful gun ownership. In the same way that the government is squandering millions of dollars and the goodwill of Canada’s responsible gun owners by blundering forward with its pointless “assault style” gun ban and confiscation, it appears committed to implementing its “red flag” law for appearances’ sake, lack of public safety impact notwithstanding.
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