Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

My contribution will be short. I am a licenced firearm owner. I am chair of the Parliamentary Friends of Shooting group. In response to Senator Wong, we have strong gun laws in this country, and the passing and debating of this motion does not change the strong gun laws in this nation which are a result of state governments agreeing to licence and regulate firearm ownership and use in this country under the National Firearms Agreement. That does not change with this motion.

Nearly one million Australians own at least one gun. That is the reality. There are a lot of us who do not think that is necessarily a bad thing. We champion our Olympic shooters and we manage our feral pests. There are social benefits, particularly with those who came to Australia through the 1950s. Our immigration story of the 1950s has resulted in a very strong family connection to hunting through, particularly, our Italian community. There are economic benefits that hunting and shooting bring to the Australian society and a $1 billion dollar industry employing tens of thousands of Australians.

This debate is just full of so many mistruths as people conflate the tragedies of Port Arthur and Lindt Cafe. Increased gun crime—which is an absolute indictment on our law enforcement agencies at a state level and at a federal level—on the streets of our cities from illicit firearms conflates the threat of terrorism into a public conversation where law-abiding firearm owners in this nation are derided and belittled by political elites who think they know better. We need a debate that is informed by fact, not by fiction or emotional language. If you read over the Hansard of this particular debate tonight you will see a lot of emotion. There is a lot of scare campaign out there and not a lot of fact. There is a lack of understanding in our media, for instance, around how guns are used and why, and how our current National Firearms Agreement actually works.

This debate has also been focused on a false argument around categorisation that is not based on science or evidence. For example, the lever-action shotgun currently in category A under the National Firearms Agreement has five shots. To increase that to seven is not an exponential increase in risk. I would urge anybody to bring forward the science on that and also to please bring forward the evidence of a lever-action shotgun being used in crime since the late 1800s. It just is not based on fact; it is based on fear.

I am not arguing for a weakening of gun laws, and I never have. I am calling for a debate around science and evidence. We need laws that get the balance right. This particular disallowance motion does nothing to change the National Firearms Agreement or the strong gun laws which have held us in such strong stead from a safety perspective, getting that balance right for the last 20 years. I support the motion.