Transit police officers in Metro Vancouver, the only armed transit officers in Canada, say they are exercising safety precautions when using Tasers with passengers.

A release issued by Sgt. Willie Merenick of the Greater Vancouver Transit Authority Police Service(GVTAPS) said the force "meets the National Use of Force Standards" and all tools, including Tasers, are used with safety in mind.

More than a dozen Taser stun guns were purchased by the force in 2007, which includes about 125 officers, to use while working to secure the regions transit system, including SkyTrain, Seabus and busses.

Freedom of information documents released show the force used the stun guns 10 times in the last 18 months, and five of those incidents were with people who tried to evade paying fares.

B.C. Solicitor General John Van Dongen defended the officers' use of the weapons on Tuesday in Victoria, when asked if the stun guns were used on people who had not paid their transit fares.

"They are fully trained to use all of the tools available to other police," he said. "They have to be formally trained for that ... 93 GVTA officers, (transit) officers have been trained for that."

Van Dongen said the transit police fall under the same independent police complaint process as other police departments in the province.

Federal Liberal public safety critic Ujjal Dosanjh said the use of a Taser on a suspect, who was on a SkyTrain platform and holding onto a railing, was 'reprehensible.'

Taser victim's mother takes story to House of Commons

The mother of a Polish immigrant who died after being Tasered at the Vancouver airport told her story to a House of Commons committee Wednesday.

Sofia Cisowski paused to wipe away tears as she told the committee that RCMP officers should have done more to save her son's life.

"Why didn't they check on my son if he was passed out?" she asked. "Didn't they have a responsibility to check on him and do what they could until the paramedics came?"

Robert Dziekanski died within minutes of being Tasered last October, although there has been no evidence directly linking his death to the device.

He spoke no English and had become confused and lost at the airport, where he had been for nine hours after arriving from Frankfurt, Germany. RCMP were called to the scene after he damaged a computer and tossed a table, and officers stunned the man within seconds of confronting him.

Tuesday would have marked Dziekanski's 41st birthday.

"It was very difficult yesterday," his mother told CTV's Mike Duffy Live. "I was shaking and I was crying. I went to the place where it happened, and set down a bouquet of flowers and a card."

"Every day is so difficult, because I will never see him anymore," she added.

The Commons committee is probing the use of Tasers. Earlier this month, MPs travelled to the airport to see where Dziekanski died.

Cisowski's lawyer, Walter Kosteckyj, said the government has not offered any sort of compensation for the incident.

"Sofia is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and some other conditions and hasn't been able to work," he said. "Certainly, we will be pursuing compensation."

Officials with Canada Border Services say airport officials did try to assist Dziekanski, giving him water and finding his luggage. The agency has also made several changes to the airport, including more surveillance cameras and a review of services offered to international travellers.

If you have more information on this story, or personal experience with Tasers, CTV British Columbia would like to hear from you. Please contact us at bcassign@ctv.ca.

With files from The Canadian Press