Editorial - Practical gun control
Date: Jan 8, 2004 9:21 AM
PUBLICATION WINNIPEG FREE PRESS
DATE : THU JAN.08,2004
PAGE : A10
CLASS : Focus
EDITION :
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Editorial - Practical gun control
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial Staff
Prime Minister Paul Martin intends to deal with difficulties in the government's
gun registration program. The attempt is likely to provoke loud clamour among the
most intense advocates and opponents of gun registration. Mr. Martin should, however,
aim to satisfy the large majority of Canadians who want a reasonable solution that
improves public safety at reasonable expense. In announcing yesterday the recall
of Parliament for Feb. 2, Mr. Martin said he was not going to scrap the national
firearms registry. "We are committed to gun control and we are committed to
the registration of weapons," he said. "But there have been a number of
problems and these problems have got to be looked at and have got to be dealt with."
One problem is compliance. Many Canadians who own guns see no merit in registering
them with the government and many have not done so, despite repeated threats and
postponements. The government believes that it has licensed 1.9 million of the 2.3
million gun-owners in the country, but it has not prisons enough to hold the other
400,000 and so they will not be forced to comply.
Another problem is administrative difficulty. The idea of writing a single list
containing entries for every gun and every gun-owner in Canada seemed feasible when
it was first floated but experience has shown that the work is beyond the means
of the government.
Another problem is expense. The program cost $200 million in 2000-01 and the government
was hoping to bring the expense down to $67 million a year by 2008-09. The number
of gun crimes in Canada, small to start with, continues to be small despite the
enormous continuing expense of registration.
All these problems can be solved if the government registers firearms when they
change hands and quits worrying about the others. The annual flow of new entries
will be reduced to a steady trickle, which will be far easier to manage than the
present campaign of forcing unwilling gun owners to dig into the backs of their
closets and haul out their dusty old shotguns. Compliance will improve, expense
will decline and eventually the government will have a list of nearly every firearm.
Albina Guarnieri, Mississauga MP and Minister of State for Civil Preparedness, who
is reviewing the gun registry program for Mr. Martin, can hardly ignore the political
symbolism of gun control, but if she focuses on practical measures that apply scarce
resources in the most efficient way to achieve useful results for Canadians, she
will have the public behind her.
Date: Jan 8, 2004 9:21 AM
PUBLICATION WINNIPEG FREE PRESS
DATE : THU JAN.08,2004
PAGE : A10
CLASS : Focus
EDITION :
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial - Practical gun control
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial Staff
Prime Minister Paul Martin intends to deal with difficulties in the government's
gun registration program. The attempt is likely to provoke loud clamour among the
most intense advocates and opponents of gun registration. Mr. Martin should, however,
aim to satisfy the large majority of Canadians who want a reasonable solution that
improves public safety at reasonable expense. In announcing yesterday the recall
of Parliament for Feb. 2, Mr. Martin said he was not going to scrap the national
firearms registry. "We are committed to gun control and we are committed to
the registration of weapons," he said. "But there have been a number of
problems and these problems have got to be looked at and have got to be dealt with."
One problem is compliance. Many Canadians who own guns see no merit in registering
them with the government and many have not done so, despite repeated threats and
postponements. The government believes that it has licensed 1.9 million of the 2.3
million gun-owners in the country, but it has not prisons enough to hold the other
400,000 and so they will not be forced to comply.
Another problem is administrative difficulty. The idea of writing a single list
containing entries for every gun and every gun-owner in Canada seemed feasible when
it was first floated but experience has shown that the work is beyond the means
of the government.
Another problem is expense. The program cost $200 million in 2000-01 and the government
was hoping to bring the expense down to $67 million a year by 2008-09. The number
of gun crimes in Canada, small to start with, continues to be small despite the
enormous continuing expense of registration.
All these problems can be solved if the government registers firearms when they
change hands and quits worrying about the others. The annual flow of new entries
will be reduced to a steady trickle, which will be far easier to manage than the
present campaign of forcing unwilling gun owners to dig into the backs of their
closets and haul out their dusty old shotguns. Compliance will improve, expense
will decline and eventually the government will have a list of nearly every firearm.
Albina Guarnieri, Mississauga MP and Minister of State for Civil Preparedness, who
is reviewing the gun registry program for Mr. Martin, can hardly ignore the political
symbolism of gun control, but if she focuses on practical measures that apply scarce
resources in the most efficient way to achieve useful results for Canadians, she
will have the public behind her.