A major gunmaker is flooding the Victorian market with 2000 semiautomatic pistols ahead of a national ban on the weapons. The $2 million shipment of Italian-made Beretta guns arrived last week. The 2000 weapons represent almost a quarter of the total number of handguns imported last financial year. At least three of the Beretta models are on a list of weapons the Federal Government intends to ban after last year's Monash University shootings. Beretta plans to sell... (GunPolicy.org)

A major review of gun ownership is planned before the end of the year as the Abbeylara Tribunal begins probing the shooting dead of John Carthy by garda marksmen. Among the issues to be decided by the tribunal, and consequently the Dáil, will be whether the recipients of the 209,000 firearms licences issued each year should have to be certified mentally fit to hold a weapon every time they apply for a new licence or renewal. Doctors, psychiatrists and solicitors... (GunPolicy.org)

Attorney-General David Young is calling for a special Toronto court to deal with nothing but gun-related cases where prosecutors would go for maximum sentences in an effort to curb gun violence. Young said he has been sickened by the recent rash of killing in the Greater Toronto Area including Friday's accidental shooting in Mississauga when a 7-year-old girl shot her 6-year-old brother with an unregistered semi-automatic .45-calibre handgun allegedly owned by her... (GunPolicy.org)

Does it make anyone else nervous that the people who seem most eager to flaunt the laws of the land are those with all the guns? More to the point, has there ever been more whining over $10? Talk about the Tea Tax. Then again, the Americans started a revolution over that tax, didn't they? And, even though revolutionaries made up only about 30 per cent of the population way back then, they succeeded. So take heart all you persecuted gun lovers, there's... (GunPolicy.org)

OTTAWA — Peter MacKay, a Nova Scotia MP who is expected to formally announce his candidacy for the federal Conservative leadership this month, backed down yesterday from a vow to defy the national firearms registry by refusing to register his .20-gauge shotgun. The Nova Scotia MP told New Glasgow's The Evening News on Monday that he did not plan to register the gun for "very personal reasons," adding that he made the decision to ignore last week's deadline for... (GunPolicy.org)

Outlaw gun owners will have no trouble from local law men, who are officially refusing to enforce Ottawa's gun registry. Calgary cops won't be chasing owners of unregistered guns because they've got no right to charge them, said a spokesman. "We haven't been given any instruction on enforcement with regards to the Act, and the mechanism isn't in place for it at this point in time to lay charges," said Insp. Paul Manuel. But he pointed out every weapons offence police... (GunPolicy.org)

Suddenly, following the senseless deaths of two teenagers in Birmingham, it seems everyone is now worrying about the number of crimes involving guns. Actually, over the past year, in the course of conversations with serving police officers, I've heard a number of them predict a rise in crimes committed by people carrying guns in much the same way as knives are carried by hoodlums. It's not a new phenomenon for certain groups to tool up before going about their,... (GunPolicy.org)

The Government has been accused by police of "diluting" plans for a minimum five-year jail term for anyone illegally carrying a gun. Representatives of rank-and-file officers denounced the measure as a "waste of time" after Downing Street confirmed that the five-year minimum would not be imposed in all cases. The disclosure — the day after Home Secretary David Blunkett had announced the mandatory minimum sentences for illegal firearms possession — led the Tories... (GunPolicy.org)

Two states have criticised the federal government over the arrival of 2,000 soon-to-be illegal hand-guns, but Justice Minister Chris Ellison laid the blame for their arrival on Victoria police. In separate attacks the NSW government said the commonwealth had failed to stem the flow of illegal guns over Australian borders, while the Victorian government claimed gun import controls must be beefed up. The state and federal governments have agreed to ban a range of... (GunPolicy.org)