How will national gun reforms impact the North Shore?

New gun laws for Australia would mean another national gun buyback scheme and a limit on the amount of guns one person can own. The president of the North Shore’s only rifle range claims these changes will put Australian Olympic and Commonwealth games shooters at a disadvantage.

Gun reform: The laws, in the wake of the Bondi terror attack, are being debated on Tuesday in Federal Parliament. They are expected to pass through the lower house today before moving to the Senate, where Labor requires the support of either the Coalition or Greens. 

• The federal reforms before parliament would tighten import controls, specifically on “assisted repeating action and straight pull repeating action firearms”. According to firearms experts, firearms of this type were used in the Bondi terror attack. 

• The reforms would also facilitate a national gun buyback scheme (as occurred in 1996–97), and allow federal intelligence agencies, such as ASIO, to have a say in state and territory firearm licensing decisions.

In the state: New South Wales already passed major gun reforms late last year, most significantly limiting individuals to have no more than four firearms each.

• These changes at the federal level are largely secondary to reforms enacted at the state and territory level. 

Local shooters: Alan Patrick, President of Hornsby Rifle Range, told the Lorikeet a limit on firearms will severely impact recreational and competitive shooters, who he claims often use multiple firearms for different ranges, events and classes of competition. 

• The Hornsby Rifle Range is one of the few shooting ranges in metropolitan Sydney, hosting rifle and pistol clubs across the North Shore and Beaches regions. The land it sits on, stretching into Berowra Valley National Park, has been used as a firing range since 1853.

Competitors impacted: Patrick said participants of both the Olympic and Commonwealth games have used the range to train. He claims that tightened import controls on firearms would affect these competitors, who often have to export and re-import their firearms for international competitions.

Patrick said the clientele of the range veered toward an older demographic, who may have grown up in a place where firearm ownership was much more common.

• “The Australian population 70 years ago was probably 75 percent rural and 25 percent city, it's now reversed”, said Patrick.

In parliament: Local MPs Zali Steggal, Nicolette Boele, and Jerome Laxale have all publicly backed the legislation. The NSW gun reform bill, which passed in December, received support from all North Shore MPs, such as Felicity Wilson, Tim James, and Alister Henskens.

The Member for Berowra was contacted for comment.

Thumbnail: 18th Battalion Memorial Rifle Club