Opinion by David Mack
I spent an hour or so ploughing through the appalling “consultation document” last night.
It fills me with dismay.
Endless pages of garbage that will have absolutely no effect on the illegal use of guns by gangs and other criminal miscreants.
It seems designed to put off the lawful firearms owner and discourage him or her.
The Prime Minister said the other day she thought “there was foreign influence” in the Freedom Protests at Parliament. Well I think there must be malign foreign influence in this campaign against law abiding gun owners and our clubs and ranges.
We have a system which has worked with complete safety and efficiency for many, many years and there is not a problem that requires this intrusive and excessive legislative effort which may effectively close down many clubs and ranges not for safety reasons but simply because of the cost and excessive bureaucracy involved in their continued existence.
This is in no ones interest and shows, once again, how unsuited the Police are to oversee the licensing of gun owners.
Government Corruption
That the Police are over-stretched and under-funded is beyond doubt. They have proved over and over again they are incapable of administering what should actually be a fairly simple body of law and administrative procedure.
They seem, with this latest trance of “regulations,” to have lost sight of their core business which is to deal effectively with CRIMINALS which the vast majority of licensed firearms owners are NOT. As a result they have lost the confidence and support of vast numbers of ordinary people who in times past would have been their most ardent supporters.
As a recent COLFO press release pointed out, individual police officers are, for the most part, not to blame.
Every single police officer I have dealt with as an endorsed license holder over time has been unfailingly courteous and efficient. They know I am not the problem and I know they have their job to do.
It is the system that stinks to high heaven and has been corrupted by government interference and, I believe, senior officers who have been pressured to conform to overseas dictates from the UN in whose pocket our Prime Minister clearly is.
An Agenda?
I don’t know what is to be done, those in power now have an agenda and are clearly impervious to reason and cogent argument. There is the looming fiasco of trying to introduce a registration system which has failed before it is even started and will cost vast amounts of taxpayer funds, just as it did in Canada, that should be being spent on other aspects of proper core policing and will have absolutely no effect on criminal use of illegal guns.
Registration may actually serve to increase the grey and black market in guns as seems to have happened after the stupid knee jerk gun confiscation, in whose interest is that?
The sort of rubbish guns that are often seized from criminals indicates that even now criminals find it hard to obtain quality firearms in this country. That may change when they seriously start importing guns from overseas to fill a growing demand.
Police Failures
Personally I am tired of being made a scapegoat for police failures to enforce the perfectly workable laws which were in place and should have prevented the Christchurch terrorist attack.
The future is very bleak for lawful sporting shooters and likely to be increasingly violent as gangs grow in strength, numbers and criminal enterprises as the police continue to be misdirected and focus on the wrong targets. These pointless law changes will have no beneficial effect of that we can be absolutely sure. In some ways they serve only to make me glad I am old.
Footnote: David Mack is a Marlborough-based experienced sporting firearm owner, a keen long-time clay bird shooter and hunter.
Please do take the time and make the effort to put in a submission for all the good it will do. If we do not respond they will think we agree with their bullshit. Never forget that for evil to triumph good men need only stand idly by and do nothing.
Submissions go to
E mail address for submissions is :- consultation@police.govt.nz
Surely, we must all have realised by now .. legitimate and law-abiding firearms ownership, possession and use in New Zealand faces an existential threat.
Through a series of mechanisms .. for example, (I) tardy Firearms Licence issuance and renewal; (ii) a completely useless Firearms Register (which we will have to pay for); (iii) the impending closure of the greater majority of our ranges (in the face of an excessive burden of bureaucratic administration and attendant costs); (iv) increased difficulty and cost in procuring ammunition, storing firearms etc; (v) increased bureaucratic administration and attendant costs associated with obtaining and maintaining a Dealer Licence .. they will whittle down the number of people willing to continue to bear the cost and difficulty of obtaining and holding a Firearms Licence .. which will have the effect of spreading an ever-greater burden of cost .. across an ever-diminishing number of Firearms Licence Holders .. which will become self-fulfilling, in further driving down the number of Firearms Licence Holders .. and so on.
Current moves towards increased certification requirements of ranges are particularly stupid. These moves will almost certainly render the greater number of places people currently go to legally and responsibly sight in their sporting / hunting rifles uncertied, and therefore illegal. If they close – where will people go? What’s the difference between sighting-in your rifle against a perfectly safe hillside at the back of a farm – and discharging your rifle while hunting in the field? It’s utterly stupid – and will undoubtedly force many people into far less safe circumstances, for sighting-in.
Recently, I wrote a Facebook post, addressing this issue .. in the context of Recreational Hunting in New Zealand .. and the suggestion that if this activity ceased, they would just use more Aerial 1080 to alternatively manage populations of wild, introduced species. I thought you might find this interesting to read:
“Our species has been hunter-gathering since time began.
Nowadays, it remains vital to our social, mental, physical, cultural, spiritual and economic wellbeing.
In a world where mental health issues are ballooning .. mental and physical well-being alone justifies the activity.
Our planet needs to produce 70% more food by later this century, to continue to feed our species. Here in New Zealand, we have an organic, free-range food source that requires practically no farming inputs, and can be sustainably managed .. taking the grazing place of an extinct species (Moa) .. and filling a vital gap, and historical link to our evolution and development as a species .. much of it on land that would otherwise be largely going to waste, from a food production perspective.
In this day and age .. when the negative impacts of the out-of-control population growth of our species is having such apocalyptic effects on our planet .. mankind can ill-afford to waste such a sustainable food source opportunity .. especially, when it involves wild, introduced species (so is not directly based upon nor endangering indigenous biodiversity, as happens in most other countries where hunting continues to be practiced).
Hundreds of thousands of people both directly and indirectly benefit .. from both participation, and consumption of the food that is harvested.
Recreational hunting is an important part of the historical and cultural heritage of modern New Zealand .. and (although the species have changed), right back to first Polynesian settlement, around 1280 A.D.
To use fossil fuels and further resources of our planet to aerially spread a WHO Class 1A exotoxin .. to kill such a valuable food resource to waste .. left to rot on the hill and in the bush unseen .. at the same time, indiscriminately killing non-target native and introduced species .. farmed and wild .. vertebrates and invertebrates .. birds, terrestrials and aquatics .. so that’s insects, birds, mammals, reptiles, and aquatic species alike .. is nothing short of criminally negligent.
How do we stand up against the blithering idiots .. blinded by their irrational, out-of-context desire to rid our country of firearms in the hands of criminals and gangs .. and supported by the similarly out-of-context United Nations Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects .. and convince them our legitimate and law-abiding firearms ownership, possession and use is for different purposes entirely?
We’ve gotta stop pissing about .. recognise times have changed .. and our sporting / recreational ownership, possession and use of firearms faces an existential threat. We must all unite, and stand up against the misguided and misled threats we face.
We must educate people .. we are not the enemy .. we are being needlessly scapegoated .. and our reasons for firearms ownership, possession and use indeed remain legitimate and law-abiding.
Indeed, these reasons go back to the very beginnings of our species.
And, in fact – they are vital to the protection of our indigenous biodiversity, here in New Zealand.
How do we do this?
Because if we don’t .. and/or if we are unsuccessful in our efforts .. then we are doomed.”
Footnote: Historically, 55% of homicides in New Zealand involve a weapon – but only 14% involved a firearm. That means 41% of homicides involved a weapon OTHER THAN a firearm. Those of us who use firearms as a “tool of trade” for our sporting / recreational activities wonder why OUR vital “tools of trade” are being scapegoated – when the majority of homicides involving a weapon see the use of a knife, hammer or similar? Firearms are nothing more than a “tool of trade”, for the sporting / recreational user!!!
400 years ago it was mandatory for all Englishmen under 40 to practice archery at the village butt to keep the skill alive and the mind sharp. They knew that war and conflict was a part of life and that the Gods of War could make an appearance at any time. To a degree my skill with a rifle is in that spirit but mostly it is in the spirit of Newton McConochie; you’ll learn no harm from the hills. My take is that the govt views LFOs as gun nuts, whereas we are a repository of ancient wisdom – bush craft, weapons handling and environmentalism. They should be fostering the spirit of the Kiwi Bushman, rugged individuals with deep skills and knowledge, not doing all they can to weaken us. One day we might just need to call upon it for reasons beyond putting food on the table.
Why is government and police so fixated with a hate firearms mentality.
Homicide statistics show firearms are involved in only about 10%. Knives (stabbings) are over double at 23%.
Can Police Association president Cahill and Ministers of police like Stuart Nash and Ms Poto Williams understand this?