A decade of reckless Liberal soft-on-crime, bail-not-jail policies have left a majority of Canadians feeling unsafe in their own neighbourhoods with a justice system that works against them. Violent crime has increased by 55%, gun crime 130% and extortion 330%.

Instead of repealing their hug-a-thug laws that put criminals first and victims last, Mark Carney’s hapless Minister of Public Safety is pushing a failed gun buyback program that he admits is a waste of money that will do nothing to keep Canadians safe.

Yesterday, in a leaked recording, Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree was caught telling the truth about the failed Liberal buyback boondoggle while breaching basic ethics:

The program is all for votes

“Quebec is in a different place than other parts of Canada, right? And this is something that is very much a big, big, big deal for many of the Quebec electorate that voted for us, right? And that’s one of the major things. I think it’s, I saw, I’m sure you’ve seen these articles where people said, you know, this is one of the things we should not execute, like as a change from Trudeau’s policies, but we’ve made the decision to go ahead.”

Carney forced me 

“But this is the mandate I was given by Carney to complete this…if I were to redo this from scratch, I would have a very different process.”

I’ll pay you back 

“In your case, what are your losses? You tell me, I’ll personally offset you.”

Ignore the law, I’ll bail you out 

“I’m not going to send the police to you…I doubt (the program) is going to go that far…I will come and bail you out if that happens, I will. You call me.” 

Mark Carney has admitted “the vast majority of firearms, illegal firearms, firearms used in crime come across our border,” yet the Liberals are continuing with a confiscation program that goes after legal, trained, tested and licensed Canadian firearms owners. That includes confiscating hunting rifles from Indigenous people exercising their treaty rights to hunt.

Anandasangaree’s buyback boondoggle is conservatively estimated to cost $742 million for a program the Minister himself admits is a waste of money and resources, pursued purely for political gain. $742 million represents 5,000 RCMP officers, 300 port scanners or 37,000 addiction treatment beds. That’s money that could go to restoring safety on our streets, ending gun smuggling and bringing our loved ones home drug-free.

Offering to bail out his tenant from criminal charges is not the first time Anandasangaree has been accused of not being impartial while upholding the law as Minister. After it was discovered he implored CBSA to overturn an immigration decision despite national security concerns, he was forced to recuse himself from files involving terrorist groups “to ensure that there is no perception of any conflict”. The Minister claimed he was simply helping a constituent, but that was also revealed to be a lie.

All of these failures stack on top of an abysmal record. The Minister has failed to ban the extortionist Bishnoi Gang and lost almost 600 non-citizen criminals in Canada, 70% of whom committed serious crimes such as sexual assault. In the pursuit of the buyback boondoggle, he’s also breaking his promise to add 1,000 RCMP and 1,000 CBSA officers.

These failures have real-world consequences: Canadians no longer feel safe in their own homes, and with good reason. This cannot go on. Mark Carney appointed Anandasangaree as Public Safety Minister. He must own up to his terrible judgment, hold his Minister accountable and fire Minister Anandasangaree.