'Stop treating us as criminals', gun club members tell MPs

Firearms clubs across the country have made an impassioned plea to MPs to vote in favour of reducing regulation for ranges.

Club leaders - often decades-long gun owners - made submissions in support of legislation to revise rules for clubs and ranges on Thursday.

The bill proposes changes to the timeframe for police inspections and for pistol and non-pistol shooting clubs to be regulated differently.

Manawatu's Rifle Rod and Gun Club's secretary David Petterson said it was less regulation, not more, that would promote firearms safety in communities.

"We've had to point people to [the] door on a couple of occasions in the last two years. We take our responsibility in the community seriously.

"We believe that the clubs are the foundation of shooting, we believe that you should have to join a club once you've got a firearms licence ... and be under some supervision and control until you show competence."

The Antique Arms Association's Auckland branch chairperson Myles Chandler was critical of the police, specifically the Firearms Safety Authority, saying gun owners no longer trusted authorities.

"Poor firearms legislation post 2019 has been patched up by ad hoc regulations, resulting in a dog's breakfast for both firearms owners and police.

"The legislation needs to be simplified and police requirements clearly prescribed. Legislation needs to recognise that the firearms owners are partners and should be encouraged not smothered by legislation."

Kaituna Blenheim Rifle Club member Malcolm Dodson, who also spoke for the National Rifle Association of New Zealand, told MPs the $10,000 fine the police were able to impose on gun clubs and ranges was "grossly excessive".

"It's a very punitive figure, I'm sure, designed to make us obey the law but in actual fact, I know police have said, 'Oh, you know, all the clubs in the country have submitted'.

"Well, the reason we've submitted is because we are amongst the most law abiding citizens in the country, and irrespective of what we think of the law, we will always comply with it, because that is our nature."

Dodson said gun club members used firearms as their chosen sport, not as weapons.

"They are for the military police and those with criminal intent.

"Clubs and members are not the problem with firearms and firearms use in New Zealand, please stop treating us as criminals that need to be controlled.

"It is not and was not the job of clubs to be the determinant as to whether a person is fit and proper to have a firearms licence.

"That was the job of the New Zealand Police, the job at which they failed, and the clubs have copped the blame."

New Zealand Antique and Historical Arms Association national president Andrew Edgcombe said the bill was a step in the right direction for making it easier to run clubs and ranges.

"It must be remembered that the majority of our existing clubs and ranges are run by small teams of dedicated volunteer, and overburdening those that choose to be club officers and officials greatly reduces an already limited supply of people willing to put their hands up and take on these roles."

Brian Bishop from the Cable Bay Pistol Club said he believed holding a gun was a right, not a privilege.

"I see it as a right. As an honest citizen I have done no criminal acts, I haven't been before the courts, I haven't done anything to lose that privilege."

The Arms (Shooting Clubs, Shooting Ranges, and Other Matters) Amendment Bill is expected to pass around the middle of 2025.

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