Canada to cap the market for handguns with new law

TORONTO (AP) — Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government introduced legislation Monday that would put a freeze on importing, buying or selling handguns.

“We are capping the number of handguns in this country,” Trudeau said.

The regulations to halt the growth of personally owned handguns are expected to be enacted this fall.

“It will be illegal to buy, sell, transfer or import handguns anywhere in Canada,” the prime minister said.

Families of shooting victims joined him at a press conference in Ottawa.

Canada already has plans to ban 1,500 types of military-style firearms and offer a mandatory buyback program that will begin at the end of the year.

Trudeau said if someone really wants to keep their assault weapon it will be made completely inoperable.

Canada already expanded background checks.

Trudeau has long had plans to enact tougher gun laws but the introduction of the new measure comes after mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and Buffalo, New York this month.

Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino called the legislation the most significant step Canada has taken in a generation.

“Countries that do a good job of controlling guns do a good job of controlling gun violence,” Mendicino said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Bill Blair, minister of emergency preparedness, said Canada is very different from the United States.

“In Canada, gun ownership is a privilege not a right,” Blair said.

“This is a principle that differentiates ourselves from many other countries in the world, notably our colleagues and friends to the south.”

Canada has had far fewer mass shootings than the US in part because of a lack of easy access to guns, though the US population also is far larger than Canada's.

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