Disastrous buy-back scheme

By Tony Orman

The government’s intention to impose a firearm registry on the firearm owning public will be a waste of time and money says Nicole McKee of the Council of Licensed Firearm Owners (COLFO). The comment followed the release of the Auditor-General investigation into the Government’s firearm buyback scheme It is a pretty damning report, said Nicole McKee of COLFO.

Key revelations of the Auditor General’s report are:-

• The cost blew out from $18 million to $35 million.
• The scheme only collected about a quarter of the prohibited firearms that Police estimate were out there. As of February, 2020, 61,332 firearms had been collected or modified, when Police estimate that there were up to 240,000 in the community.
• There were major deficiencies in how Police kept their records of e-endorsement firearms.
• There is no assessment that this scheme will make us any safer.

A key recommendation was that police strengthen their engagement with firearm owners and dealers.

Damage

Nicole McKee said clearly the Auditor General had seen that Police’s efforts to make licence firearm owners as criminals is damaging New Zealand. Gun registry will be a colossal waste of time and money.

She considered there is one big disappointment in the report. The Auditor-General says that the SAP system was one of the ‘strengths of the system’.

This is the same system that exposed hundreds of firearm owners addresses and bank accounts, said Nicole McKee.

COLFO would continue to advocate on behalf of the law-abiding firearm owners that the government should not have such blatant disregard for firearm owners’ personal information.

Overall, the Report clearly shows what we already knew, that the Government’s proposed gun registry will be a colossal waste of time and money.