The BC Wildlife Federation has issued a press release explaining why Jack Layton’s ‘compromise’ on the Long-Gun Registry impasse just won’t cut the mustard – BCWF says “No Thanks” to Layton’s Compromise on Long-Gun Registry. They want the long-gun registry scrapped because no matter how you slice it, they would still be treated as ‘paper criminals’:
The BC Wildlife Federation says, “Thanks, but no thanks,” to Layton’s efforts. Not only is his proposed compromise virtually identical to the one floated by Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff this spring, it is also unconstitutional. How could it not be a crime to violate federal criminal law?
Layton’s compromise is to decriminalize any long-gun owner’s failure to register, but if Layton’s bill became law, anyone accepting to pay a “ticket” for an un-registered long gun would be automatically pleading guilty. This means they would most likely have to accept at least a 5-year ban on owning or acquiring a firearm.
“Canadian gun owners have not asked for an easier way to plead guilty, but to stop being treated as criminals.” says BC Wildlife Federation Firearms Committee Chair, Mike Fowler. “We support laws that protect Canadians from criminal behaviour; the long-gun registry fails this test. Criminals are not affected by gun laws; only law abiding citizens can meet the licensing requirements. No piece of paper placed beside a gun can improve public safety.”
Matt Gurney picks up on this theme in today’s column – Sorry, Jack. The gun registry can’t be saved:
It won’t work. Layton fundamentally misunderstands why the registry is so hated by millions of Canadians. It’s not about fees or paperwork. The problem is that the registry, from its very inception, has symbolized the political elite’s distrust of anyone so retrograde as to own a gun.
By the very rationale advanced by the Chretien Liberals that introduced it — making the public and police safer by collecting information on individuals and their property — the registry could only ever serve to alienate those that it targets. Any law-abiding citizen, if told they must submit private information to the government for the safety of society, cannot help but feel that that very same society considers them dangerous.
So this is the essence of the objection by law-abiding duck-hunters. They are tired of being used politically by left-leaning politicians and top-cop big brass.:
They want this symbol of unfairness, of the suspicion with which their government regards them, destroyed, so that they don’t have to feel like pariahs anymore. Everything that has happened since — the massive cost overruns, the bureaucratic nightmares, the lost documentation and constant data-entry errors, not to mention the Liberal flip-flop on their promise to never use the registry to try and ban guns — has merely added to the outrage.
Meanwhile, Police Chiefs are still waging their war of words and left-leaning newspapers like the Record are backing them up with excessively partisan rhetoric like this:
Locally, Waterloo Regional Police Chief Matt Torigian has made an exceptionally compelling case in favour of the registry. He offered his opinion in a column that appeared in The Record on Saturday. Torigian says the regional police used the registry 13,629 times in 2009 and 9,708 times so far during 2010. This is about 31 times a day. He adds that police use the register for a specific purpose. They do not make routine queries.
For example, police may want to know if guns of any kind exist in a home to which they have been called to investigate a report of domestic violence. Who can blame them? Would Hoeppner, the MP sponsoring the private member’s bill, or Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who has opposed the registry, want this information if they had to go into a home to investigate such a crime? Surely they would; or, rather, surely they should.
Good grief!!!
And what about Julian Fantino? Why didn’t the Record include him on their naughty list? (H/T Shotgun)
Let’s expose the long-gun registry for what it really is: a political tool to keep the law-abiding Canadian citizens under the thumbs of Big Cities, Big Government, Big Law Enforcement and Big Bureaucracy.
Some pundits have expressed surprise that the tough-on-crime Conservative Party would be against the long-gun registry. Well they are concerned about real criminals – not paper ones. It seems that in the world of the Left that belief system is reversed.
This is the time to really pressure our MPs to side with the people who got them there in the first place – instead of voting to insult them.
