MONTREAL (CBC) - Quebec should create its own gun registry if the federal registry is scrapped, the opposition Parti Québécois said Wednesday as the House of Commons voted in support of a private members bill calling for abolition of the national long-gun registry.

Quebecs national assembly unanimously passed a motion urging Ottawa to preserve the national firearms registry.

Public Security Minister Jacques Dupuis said he had written to his federal counterpart, Peter Van Loan, and to representatives of the three Commons opposition parties on Tuesday night asking them to oppose the bill.

But Conservative MPs, bolstered by a handful of Liberals and New Democrats, produced a majority giving approval in principle Wednesday to killing the registry. Tory MPs roared their approval as the vote on Bill C-391 was read out in the Commons: 164 for, 137 against. The bill now goes to committee for examination.

PQ intergovernmental affairs critic Alexandre Cloutier said the effectiveness of the registry has been eroded by the Harper government. He said most guns are no longer registered because of repeated moratoriums enacted by Ottawa.

Dupuis said the registry has become a crucial tool for police.

As an example, when the police are called to a home for domestic violence, let's say, they can know in advance if there is a gun in the house.

But the Liberal minister said a Quebec-only registry would not be effective because guns can easily cross provincial boundaries.

On Tuesday, Montreal police Chief Yvan Delorme issued a rare political statement defending the registry.

Delorme said the registry helped prevent a potential crime following the Dawson College shooting in 2007. He said police received a report that another individual had been making threats, and the registry alerted officers that this person owned several guns, which officers seized.

The vote on the registry came barely a month ahead of the 20th anniversary of an event that helped to inspire the creation of the registry, Delorme noted.

On Dec. 6, 1989, gunman Marc Lépine stormed into the École Polytechnique with a rifle, killing 14 female students and wounded 27 other people.