By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese apparently needs a new sales pitch for what the country’s media refers to as “gun reform” in the aftermath of the Bondi Beach mass shooting, and according to ABC (Australian Broadcast Corporation), “Only four jurisdictions have signed up to the government’s gun buyback scheme.”
The “reforms” to which the media is alluding—a gun control package put forth by Albanese with a deadline of March 31—would make getting a gun license for law-abiding Australians much harder. Apparently, the Albanese government has not paid attention to what occurs in the U.S., where criminals don’t bother with licenses, background checks or waiting periods.
The Guardian is reporting that the Albanese government is accusing officials in states and territories of “standing in the way” of the prime minister’s gun control scheme because they have refused to sign onto it. So far, according to the report, only the government in New South Wales is clearly supporting the so-called “reforms.” Meanwhile, Western Australia and Tasmania have done their own “buyback” schemes, while governments in South Australia, the Northern Territory and Queensland “have all ruled out their support.”
The Guardian quoted Jonno Duniam, shadow home affairs minister, asserting the gun buyback was “a desperate overreach … in relation to the rights of Australians.”
“The gun buyback was an attempted distraction to paper over the Albanese government’s failures on antisemitism and extremism,” Duniam said. “The Coalition opposed this scheme from the outset because it didn’t address the real issues facing the country in the wake of the Bondi attack.”
However, disarmament efforts have been underway. The ABC report noted that Western Australia saw “more than 83,000 firearms surrendered art a cost of $64.3 million.” The story also estimated that “roughly” one-fourth of the nation’s firearms are in Victoria. There are an estimated 974,000 known legal guns in the country, and about 244,000 are in Victoria.
Following the Port Arthur massacre in 1996, The Guardian recalled that more than 650,000 firearms had been surrendered and destroyed, for a cost of $371 million.
There is no Second Amendment equivalent in Australia, where gun ownership is a government-regulated privilege.
James Walsh, chief executive of the Shooting Industry Foundation of Australia, issued a statement quoted by The Guardian, “This buyback hasn’t delivered a victory for public safety, it has only delivered uncertainty for thousands of law abiding Australians and the businesses that support them. These are livelihoods being dismantled by botched legislation passed overnight. The government must recognize the human cost of their refusal to consult with us. It is not too late for the Albanese and state governments to fix this.”
