The game of politics is often played on a field of unintended consequences. When taking place on the national stage the consequences often hurt Northerners the most.
Take the failed long gun registry, for example.
It was implemented by Jean Chretien's Liberal government in 1995, largely in response to pressure from gun control groups following the Ecole Polytechnique massacre in Montreal in 1989. Marc Lepine, armed with a semi-automatic rifle, shot and killed 14 women and injured 14 other people in a deranged rampage targeting “feminists” at the school.
The previous Progressive Conservative government had already passed stringent new legislation requiring citizens to complete firearms training before getting a licence but it was the Liberals who pushed through Bill C-68.
The new law required all firearms to be registered and for people to present a firearms certificate to purchase ammunition. The registry was widely cheered in urban centres where there are few firearms, except perhaps those obtained illegally by criminals and thus not subject to the registry.
So suddenly, in places like Whati and Paulatuk a wall of red tape went up over night.
It was an additional hassle in a place like Calgary but what could people in remote communities do to continue putting meat on the table without breaking the law? Where to go to take the firearms course? Or get a picture for the licence? What about bullets?
No big deal in a city filled with grocery stories but in the North, hunting is not just a way of life, it's often the only way of life.
The roadblocks put in front of Northerners, particularly Indigenous Northerners in remote communities, is the unintended consequence of the long gun registry.
Fast forward to 2012. The Conservative government under Stephen Harper scraps the hated gun registry but they could not just leave it at that, could they?
To bolster its standing as the party of law and order, the Harper government passed the Tackling Violent Crime Act in 2008. The legislation carried minimum sentences for a number of crimes, including firearms offences.
The gun registry was flawed because too often it ensnared otherwise law abiding citizens, the Conservatives argued.
What was needed, they said, was a law that targeted criminals. If they were using guns to commit crimes, the answer was harsher punishments.
This argument played well to their base and was an effective shield in fending off critics who questioned the wisdom of dismantling the gun registry. But it's almost certain that in enacting this law the Conservative government of the day was not thinking about suicidal Indigenous men in remote northern communities facing years in prison in places where there are no prisons.
NWT Supreme Court judge Louise Charbonneau recently struck down a portion of the law that required mandatory minimum sentences in two cases – both involving Indigenous men using firearms in isolated communities.
Corey Cardinal of Inuvik tried to shoot himself in the head with a sawed-off shotgun but was thwarted at the last second by a friend. He angrily fired two more shots but hit nor injured anyone.
He was was facing five years in prison under the Harper legislation, because a sawed-off shotgun is considered as prohibited weapon.
Tony Howard Kakfwi of Fort Good Hope was looking at four years in prison after firing a gun outside a band meeting.
Dragging people off to a penitentiary down south who are suffering from mental health problems was not the intent of the Harper legislation but it is the consequence.
Meanwhile, offenders in domestic violence cases typically get far more lenient sentences. Deh Cho MLA Michael Nadli, who broke his wife's wrist during an argument in 2015, received a sentence of 45 days in jail.
Judge Charbonneau was wise to rule against the mandatory sentences Cardinal and Kakfwi would have received.
Politicians are usually not interested in nuances. They like solutions that sound good in sound bites.
It's important the judiciary pick apart the rubble with a scalpel when the politicians drop down laws with a sledgehammer.