Continuing firearm violence means New Zealanders are no safer despite the promises made of legislation passed against licensed firearm owners, according to COLFO.
COLFO spokesperson Hugh Devereux-Mack says the recent gun violence is undeniable evidence that New Zealanders have not been made safer by the infamous firearm ban and buyback of 2020/21, or changes to licensing laws.
“New Zealanders were specifically promised that the firearm ban and law changes would make them safer – and yet we see weekly evidence, particularly in Auckland, that the laws have failed to deliver.
“The laws changed nothing because they were directed at fit and proper firearm licence holders, not criminals. Punitive action against people who act responsibly inside the system does nothing to stop criminals willing to act outside it
Government Goofed
“Let’s be clear – this horrible violence is largely being conducted by existing criminals – people already operating outside the legal system. The only thing that will deal with firearm violence is greater intensity of Police work, like Operation Tauwhiro, against the criminal element in society.
“The Government has let us down. The firearm community wanted stricter controls administered via an independent firearms authority which was committed to by government. While they claim to have a ‘strong track record on firearms crime’[1], the Government has failed to deliver the independent authority and instead set it up as a unit inside the Police which is still subject to the resource constraints noted by the Police Commissioner[2],” Devereux-Mack says.
Firearm Register?
The response to the Auckland shooting yesterday by Deborah Russell, Chair of the Finance and Expenditure Select Committee, which reviewed the firearm ban and other firearm licensing changes, had been to refer to restrictions on firearm owners, such as an impending firearm register.
Devereux-Mack pointed out that most of the firearms seized would never have been on a register, and there was no difference in outcome between a shooting with a registered or unregistered firearm.
If someone was using a firearm – such as in a shooting – Russell said that “they’re going to have to have their firearms licence with them and be able to demonstrate the firearm is their firearm and not someone else’s.[3]“
Comments from Government about a firearms register and other changes to legislation affecting legal firearm owners, should cease until government can prove they will actually make New Zealand safer.
Devereux-Mack added that COLFO opposed general arming of Police because it would worsen public safety.
NOTE: COLFO’s comments on the general arming of Police can be read here.
For further information contact: Hugh Devereux-Mack. 027 362 0853
When will governments realise crime rates are the consequence of society’s culture that governments have created.?Rogernomics and neo-liberal policies created an arrogant, selfish, greed-ridden culture. Thus crime rates soar.
Politicians need to take stock.
Good forthright stuff by COLFO spokesperson Hugh Devereux-Mack. Strong advocacy is what is needed in the face of arrogant governments. The definition of totalitarian is relating to a system of government that is centralised and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state. That fits the current government like an iron glove.
Restricting – eventual confiscation- of firearm ownership is the norm for totalitarianism.
Even if it was possible to ban and confiscate all firearms it would never stop gun crimes as anyone with reasonable engineering skills could make a rifle or pistol, then flog it off to criminals at a tidy profit. If the truth was known there are probably crims that can already manufacture a firearm.
Weapons used to kill, whether firearms, knives, baseball bats or motor vehicles are not the criminals – but those who employ them are.
Given that government has already enacted questionable legislation not in accordance with its electoral promises, it is inevitable, that the motives of everything parliament reviews become suspect.
Regarding the current debate, there are several aspects relating to firearms to be considered.
There was considerable objection made to the confiscation of military-style weapons, but ‘could it be that the Mosque murders merely provided New Zealand government with the opportunity to conform to the British and European models for fire-arms control? The ‘civilized’ nations do tend to keep in step.
‘Might not International respectability, rather than more sinister motives at a time of frequent ‘terrorist attacks’, have been the primary objective?’
Regarding the newly enacted restriction. It would be interesting to know, ‘what type of firearm was employed in each of the killings, consequent of the banning of military-style weapons? Also, of the 1,000 and more firearm offences what percentage were committed with illegally owned weapons?’
‘Does the recent spike in firearm-murders in Auckland denote a statistical increase in such crimes?’
Many claim the Gangs to be holding illegal weapons, ‘does evidence of this exist?’ If there is evidence, ‘ought not the police apply for warrants to search, confiscate illegal firearms, and prosecute? If the answer is in the affirmative, and government is serious about keeping citizens safe, it must act decisively.
If there is no evidence, then suspicion alone will not justify ‘raiding gangs’ headquarters, for to do so would be a demonstration of the much-denounced government-authoritarianism.
As long as firearm legislation does not detrimentally affect law-abiding sportsmen’s ownership of weapons, then there can be little objection to an efficient firearms’ register. Pistol Clubs, Collectors and Dealers in Weapons can be similarly registered.
The fruits of ill-considered legislation, borne of a desire to be seen to do something (anything), when haste, ideology and ignorance combined to produce an unworkable result which has produced such counter-productive outcomes.
There is a lovely near-onomatapoic term to describe such a mess!