CANADIAN SHOOTING SPORTS ASSOCIATION / CANADIAN INSTITUTE FOR LEGISLATIVE ACTION

TEAM CSSA E-NEWS - Nov. 1, 2012

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GUN REGISTRY DATA FINALLY HISTORY – BUT U.N. MARKING SCHEME LOOMS

The Minister of Public Safety has made the long-awaited announcement that the long-gun registry data has been deleted, except data relevant to Quebec.

It is greeted with tepid enthusiasm by the many gun owners who believe the announcement is anticlimactic. They would be only partly right. While the firearms community knew it was coming since the last election, let’s not downplay its importance too much. This is the first time a country has rolled back so-called government “gun control” legislation anywhere in the world. It may feel like it’s too little, too late, but rest assured we are the envy of international firearms advocates everywhere. And firearms owners themselves can claim much of the credit for shuffling their guns with friends and acquaintances to make the data even more irrelevant.

Government officials could infer that sport shooters and hunters are never satisfied. For an explanation, they should look in a mirror. We were promised many years ago that a Conservative government would gut the previous Liberal legislation in Bill C-68. The Conservatives assured us they would move heaven and earth once they achieved a majority. The removal of the registry is, however, more nibble than bite. The Conservatives must avoid confusing what looks like a lack of gratitude with our true sentiment – we feel unfulfilled.

The Conservatives are wont to say the battle against specious Liberal “gun control” measures has just begun. Given that the Conservatives are the sole party that’s trending in the direction of greater firearms freedom, we owe them our support for the time being.

But, the real test lies in the coming announcement regarding the U.N. firearms marking regulations.

It remains to be seen if the Conservatives will quash the Liberals’ ill-conceived U.N. gun marking scheme. We can only hope that the early legislative indications in the Canada Gazette recently were the work of sneaky anti-gun bureaucrats now shoved to the back of the room by more trustworthy Conservative policy-makers.

The serial numbers that currently appear on all imported firearms provides police with the information they will ever need to catch bad guys who might abuse certain guns. There is zero need for additional legislated markings other than to bootlick anti-gun advocates. Many firearms manufacturers have already warned they cannot comply with the markings because the Canadian marketplace is too small to bother. Additional marking requirements could signal the end of new firearms entering Canada for sale. While that is the last thing gun owners want, it’s exactly what the anti-gun lobby wants.

So, we wait with bated breath for tangible proof that the Conservative government is indeed in the corner of responsible gun owners. As the political record will show, hell hath no wrath like a gun owner scorned. Ask Mark Holland.
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YOUR MEMBERSHIP DUES ARE NOT ENOUGH: If you want to defend your right to own and use a firearm -- if the freedom to hunt and shoot is important to you -- then you need to support CILA, the Canadian Institute for Legislative Action. CILA defends your firearms rights on Parliament Hill, the United Nations, in provincial legislatures and in courtrooms across Canada. Be part of the solution. Please support CSSA-CILA today by donating here: http://www.cdnshootingsports.org/membership.html
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GUN SHOW THIS WEEKEND: Sunday, November 4 at Woodstock Fairgrounds at 875 Nellis Street in Woodstock, Ontario. From Highway 401 take Highway 2 west and proceed a few minutes into town -- watch for Gun Show signs on the right at MacKenzie and/or West Avenues. Show times 7:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Guests are $5 with ladies and accompanied children under 16 free. Lots to see, buy, sell and trade -- 180 to 200 tables. Free parking and a good snack bar is available. For more info please call 905-679-8812. Upcoming Ontario shows can be seen at www.ontariogunshows.com – and remember that clocks go back one hour this Saturday at midnight.
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DEAD REGISTRY IS A HUNTING BOOSTER: Cool temperatures and bright sunny skies greeted deer hunters on Friday morning on the opening day of deer hunting season in Nova Scotia. Some gun shop owners have already seen an upswing in their business and they're crediting the federal government's decision to scrap the long gun registry.

"I took in 12 of them in one week and they were all gone," said Bob Ferguson, the owner of Ferguson's Sport Shop. "I ordered more of them and I can't get any more. Guns I get today are very hard. They're backlogged with guns."

Ferguson has been running his sport shop in Westville for 35 years and he says this is the busiest he's seen it in years. The long gun registry was scrapped by the federal government in April. Ferguson said some hunters who were once hesitant to head out, are now dusting off their old firearms.

"More older people are getting out this year. Younger ones are getting out with their fathers with school off here around Pictou County," said Ferguson. "They're getting out there for the first time with their dads."

Mark Koszkulics and his son Matthew are one of those father and son teams. Matthew can't carry his own rifle until next year. But his father says less paper work means it will be easier to pass on the family's hunting tradition.

"They should get a chance to do that and maybe this will help," said Koszkulics. "Maybe some of the young fellas will get a chance to hunt now. There will be more people that get back into it again or continue doing it."

Bob Ferguson says even though there may be more guns out there this year, that doesn't mean safety will be ignored. "They know they're only allowed to hunt so far off the road now, some distance away from a house," said Ferguson. "They know this now. And they're taking it pretty good now. They know the rules and they're abiding by them."

For the first time, this year the province is requiring deer hunters to submit a report to track whether or not they've taken any deer. That way the province hopes to have a better understanding of the deer population. (CBC News – October 26, 2012)
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OOPS – FEDS LOSE TRACK OF 2,673 FIREARMS: The federal government lost $1.9 million last year in pilfered property, including vehicles, laptops, smart phones, cameras, furniture and even several dozen military weapons. Another $8.6 million worth of government property - including almost 2,700 more weapons - was lost, damaged or destroyed accidentally. The lengthy list of lost, stolen, damaged or misplaced articles is contained in the federal public accounts for the fiscal year 2011-12, released Tuesday. Computer equipment and BlackBerrys were the items most commonly reported stolen or lost across all government departments, raising questions about the security of the information they contained.

But the most eyebrow-raising property losses were cited by National Defence, which reported the theft of 56 weapons and accessories, plus 491 items of unidentified "military-specific equipment." The department also reported the theft of almost 8,000 pieces of non-military specific equipment, 35 pieces of technical equipment and six items of telecommunication equipment, among other things. National Defence further reported another 2,673 weapons and 3,804 items of military-specific equipment were lost, damaged or destroyed accidentally. "The security and protection of military assets is a priority for the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces," the department said in a statement. "In cases where theft or loss of public property occurs, due to an offence or other illegal act, an investigation is conducted by the chain of command and any necessary disciplinary or remedial actions are carried out to fix the problem." (The Vancouver Sun – October 30, 2012)
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MEDIA SPIN -- REGISTRY SAVINGS DON’T ADD UP: The Conservative government that championed the end of what it calls the “wasteful and ineffective” long gun registry can’t say exactly how much the registry’s repeal will save taxpayers.

More than seven months after the registry was officially ended in every province and territory except Quebec, the RCMP is citing a 2008 report — based on a 2004 costing model — to suggest the registry’s repeal will save somewhere between $1.5 million and $4 million a year. The registry of all firearms cost $7.7 million to operate in 2010-11, the last full year for which information is available. So why are the projected savings so small?

Neither the RCMP nor the public safety minister’s office will offer an explanation, although the ongoing registration of handguns and restricted weapons must account for some of the difference. “We have nothing else to say on this issue other than what we have provided you,” RCMP spokesman Sgt. Greg Cox responded in an email after almost a week of correspondence with The Canadian Press. Nor is the RCMP able to provide any cost estimate of destroying the gun registry data, saying only that it will be absorbed within the national police force’s budget. “The staff who are working on the project to destroy the data are RCMP employees who are also working on other day-to-day tasks,” Cox wrote.

Francoise Boivin, NDP justice critic, believes the government’s inability to provide precise costing says a great deal about years of gun registry spin. “If your accountant was answering that way you would fire him on the spot,” Boivin said in an interview. “They’ve got all the information. Problem is, they don’t divulge it because they’re worried it might not prove exactly the point they’ve been stressing over and over.”

Conservatives have claimed for years that the gun registry cost at least a billion dollars, and possibly two. “I don’t know who’s right on that, but certainly it’s north of $1 billion,” Public Safety Minister Vic Toews told a parliamentary committee last June. Toews’ accounting only works if the long-run registry is combined with the federal gun licensing system — a matched set under the 1995 Liberal gun control reforms.

And as Toews well knows, and some disgruntled gun owners have learned of late as their renewals came up, firearms licences remain firmly in place under the Conservative government. In March 2005 the net cost of the entire firearms program was pegged at $946 million, according to the auditor general. That figure included both licensing and registration. An examination of RCMP annual reports by The Canadian Press shows that in the first five full years of Conservative rule, gun registration cost a total of $48.7 million while “licensing and supporting infrastructure” cost $259.2 million.

Put another way, registration cost less than a fifth as much as licensing. Firearms licences remain the law of the land for all gun owners, whose individual long gun weapons are no longer registered.

And that’s where the highly polarized arguments on both sides of the gun registry debate start to break down.

Gun control advocates, and many police groups, argued the registry was an indispensable public safety tool because it allowed police to use the registry database to determine whether weapons might be on a premise. It also helped in the tracing of crime scene weapons... (The Canadian Press – October 28, 2012)

CSSA/ CILA REPLIES WITH LETTER TO THE EDITOR: RE: RCMP can't or won't say how much repeal of gun registry will save taxpayers. Your article misses a very important point. Import/Export records compiled since the 1960s show a net import of 21 million firearms. Since firearms last for centuries with a modest amount of care, it is safe to say that the seven million firearms recorded in the RCMP's registry represented less than half of the firearms in Canada.

Since the Firearms Act has cost Canadians a cool $2.2 billion thus far, it is safe to say the financial bleeding had not ended. As well, spending ten cents on a program that doesn't work is money foolishly spent. While police have an impossible time demonstrating how a single life was ever saved by the registry, it is easy to demonstrate where lives were lost on this foolish boondoggle. Has anyone noticed that since the cessation of the long gun registry, the streets have not run with blood and police are still able to solve crimes? The registry was a lie, a sham perpetrated on the citizens of Canada. (By Tony Bernardo -- Canadian Institute for Legislative Action -- October 28, 2012)

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NEWS AGENCY SAYS GUN PROPAGANDA ABOUNDS: What is “gun homicide” or “gun crime”? Do we have knife homicide, poison homicide or rope homicide? Not unless we are really really stupid because the means or instrument has nothing to do with causing the homicide.

Daily we watch and see propaganda and the most evil of organisations at work indoctrinating us and say nothing. We don't object and could nor be bothered and then one day we wake up and say what happened, why did somebody not do something?

The implication falsely promoted is guns caused the homicide. This connection was deliberately introduced and promoted by gun control to promote and make that connection in peoples minds.

What is the importance and false promise of making this connection? Obviously if we control guns “gun homicide” will reduce. Yeah! Right! We know that is a lie but we will still promote gun control and believe the connection exists. Why is that?

Most including virtually all firearm owners believe gun control will help. Some, a little might be good. Prove it first before oppressing people. The first step to removing a right is the hardest, after that is is just a matter of time. All it take is to remove others rights and the final outcome is set.

That is how good this propaganda is. Believers are now an agent for gun control out of fear for the consequences promised by gun control and will fight and object to removal of all restrictions to their last breath. They want those restrictions to feel safe as promised by the lies of gun control. That safety is an illusion and does not exist. It is a lie to remove our rights with our help and permission.

Who is protecting our rights to be armed and defend ourselves our loved ones and possessions? To live in freedom, safety and happiness without the attention of criminals or the oppression of governments boot?

If you are not protecting your rights nobody else is. It is your right and your safety and if you do not value your rights as your very valuable property then you do not want the rights you should enjoy.

How sad is this situation? Are we gun control agents or do we protect that right to survival, freedom and happiness we have had since the dawn of time?

We cannot be both wanting freedom, safety and security and removal of that right. Nobody can be a little bit pregnant. Which are you? A person who falsely believes gun control and oppression of some or all can help or a person who wants to live in freedom, safety and happiness? (www.news24.com – October 30, 2012)
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THANKS FOR YOUR SUPPORT!

The CSSA is the voice of the sport shooter and firearms enthusiast in Canada. Our national membership supports and promotes Canada's firearms heritage, traditional target shooting competition, modern action shooting sports, hunting, and archery. We support and sponsor competitions and youth programs that promote these Canadian heritage activities.

To join or donate to the CSSA, visit: http://www.cdnshootingsports.org/membership.html

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CANADIAN SHOOTING SPORTS ASSOCIATION / CANADIAN INSTITUTE FOR LEGISLATIVE ACTION
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