In Canada ‘Firearms aficionados celebrating gun registry’s impending demise’

By Doug Marner
Cowichan News Leader and Pictorial
Vancouver Island, Canada
November 14, 2009 4:00 PM

At least one local outdoorsman is celebrating the fact Canada’s gun registry will likely soon be gone.

Bob Boswell, the firearms training officer for the Valley Fish and Game Club, said removal of the registry is long overdue.

“It has not prevented a crime, it has not helped solve a crime,” said Boswell. “The firearms act really was inconvenient for gun owners and even against our rights.”

Nanaimo-Cowichan MP Jean Crowder was on the losing side of a 164 to 137 vote that abolished the controversial act Nov. 4.

Crowder said last week the NDP worked closely with the police on this file before she decided which way to vote.

“They’ve got some good information that shows how crime has been decreased since the gun registry was implemented,” said Crowder.

Supporters of the registry have suggested it’s useful for the police because it can pinpoint firearms registered in a home before they walk into a domestic violence situation, hostage taking or similar situation.

Boswell, however, doesn’t buy the police suggestion that the registry has helped.

He said shootings in cities like Toronto and Vancouver have never resulted in the police telling the public that the gun registry helped them solve the crimes.

Although the program cost an estimated $2 billion to create, the auditor general reported in 2006 that cancelling the program would only save taxpayers $3 million a year.

Abolishing the long gun registry will not mean an abolition of gun control in Canada.

The rest is here.

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