r/canadaguns • u/AutoModerator • Oct 09 '22

Weekly Newbies & FAQ Thread - Post your questions here for PAL/RPAL application, timelines, CFSC/CFSRC, references & requirements, or general new to firearms ownership -type questions

This thread will be used for the "new"-type questions, PAL/RPAL applications, references, CFSC/CFRSC requirements, storage/transport, or other general "new-to-me" firearms ownership questions.

In response to this thread, the community was quite positive for a thread to cover these subjects.

These threads will be stickied for a week, renewing every Sunday @ about 0600 AST. Previous threads here. Take a look, your question may have been answered!

If you have any suggestions for this thread, please feel free to ask here, or send the Mods a message.

Thank you!

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u/jaredmn Oct 14 '22

Just to clarify, the requirement is that the route, “in all circumstances, is reasonably direct”. If you’re travelling several hours, you need to eat. If you stop at a restaurant, I think it would be tough to say your route isn’t reasonably direct. Also consider that the regs specifically account and allow for situations where, during transport, your gun needs to be left unattended in the car. However, if the range is a 10-minute drive from your home, it becomes a lot less reasonable to stop for a sit-down meal.

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u/[deleted] Oct 14 '22

Has Ian Runkel done a video on this? I don't remember reading about court precedent.

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u/jaredmn Oct 14 '22 edited Oct 14 '22

If he has, I’d be very interested to see it. The problem with laws that make references to notions like “reasonable” and “in all circumstances”, is that it becomes nearly impossible to give a straight answer. If someone were charged for violating this condition and a decision was given by the courts, that decision really only applies to the specific circumstances of that case. Any number of circumstances can affect whether the route was reasonably direct: distance, time of day, traffic, weather, maybe you have low blood sugar and need to eat more often, maybe you have back problems and need to take breaks from driving, maybe you feel sick and need to stop, and so on and so on. Honestly, for the Crown to bother trying to prosecute someone on this, I think the person would need to have taken a pretty clearly unreasonably indirect route.

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u/iloveneuro Oct 14 '22

If we didn’t laws like this we wouldn’t have lawyers and judges and legislation would be 10x longer minimum.

It sucks when you are trying to figure it out but most laws are written this way and need to be debated in court on a case by case basis when challenged.

Ex: criminal code - dangerous operation (“dangerous driving”)

320.13 (1) Everyone commits an offence who operates a conveyance in a manner that, having regard to all of the circumstances, is dangerous to the public.

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u/jaredmn Oct 14 '22

I fully understand that. I’m not saying that there is a better alternative to having laws that require interpretation, for the reasons you point out (except the one about a world without lawyers — that would be great), it would be impossible to write laws that account for every scenario. I’m just saying that they, unfortunately but necessarily, result in confusion and an inability for most people to actually know the law.

It is a principle of the Rule of Law that the law must be knowable — people need to be able to understand what is and isn’t against the law in order to be governed by the law. However, the reality is that for most people to get a reliable answer to a question like, “Can I stop for lunch on the way back from the shooting range”, they would really need to get an expensive legal opinion from a lawyer. Even then, the opinion will essentially come down to, “In my expert legal opinion, a judge would likely decide that… but they might not,” and it will only apply to the very specific circumstances you’ve asked about. Even the government bodies that are responsible for administering a certain law (like the Chief Firearms Officer) aren’t particularly helpful. Either they won’t tell you what is and isn’t legal (“We’re not allowed to provide legal advice”), or they will, but you’ll call the next day and ask the same question to a different agent and get a different answer. The only way to get a definitive answer to the question is to be charged with an offence and find out what the judge decides (judges don’t just interpret law, they make law, because the law, as it’s written, is incomplete).

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u/iloveneuro Oct 14 '22

Fully agree with you.

It would be incredibly helpful if they released a guidance document on acceptable interpretations (which they have done for other regulations). They’ll never put resources towards helping people be lawful though. They would rather run people through the courts and make things more illegal then they already are.