Important news for gun owners

April 15, 2008

The Conservative Government’s commitment to scrap the costly and ineffective long gun registry is unshakable!
Prime Minister Stephen Harper in his October 16 Speech from the Throne stated he would “again ask Parliament to repeal the wasteful long-gun registry”.

The Conservative minority government re-introduced the repeal legislation (C-21), but not one of the opposition parties will support us and pass the repeal law.

Until the Conservative government can pass the law, if you’re a gun owner, we’re committed to keep you safe from needless prosecution under the current registration requirements. Tell your friends, it’s extremely important for all firearms owners to keep their firearms licence current.

Conservative government measures announced in Budget 2008 will protect non-restricted firearms owners from criminal possession, as the owners take the necessary steps to bring themselves back into compliance (e.g. obtaining a firearms licence or registration certificate). We accomplished this by renewing or extending ‘the amnesty’ until May 16, 2009.

The Conservative government will also extend the fee waiver associated with renewing or upgrading an existing firearms licence until May 16, 2009.

Here’s the background

As a law abiding firearms owner, if you accidentally allowed your Possession Only Licence (POL) to expire, you could not renew your POL unless you could show proof of having completed a safety course.

This requirement made no sense to me. You might have owned firearms legally and held a valid licence for 50 years, but when you forgot to renew your licence and it expired, you were treated as though you’d never had a licence.  The other obviously unacceptable option was to turn your gun into the RCMP station.

I have been working hard to change these POL requirements. The new measure proposes to permit the renewal of expired POLs in order to enhance compliance with the Firearms Act. The extension of the fee waiver with the amnesty will eliminate any reason to delay, further encouraging renewals.

What’s scary is that nearly 100,000 Canadians now hold Possession-Only Licences that HAVE EXPIRED! If you’re one of them and continue to own firearms, you have put yourself at risk because you have broken the law and own your firearms illegally.

It’s important that you come back into compliance with the law. It very easy as far as filling out the forms and getting licence renewed. There is no charge, and my constituency office will be happy to walk you through the form details.  The requirement to hold a valid Firearms Licence remains the law.

Be sure to renew your licence before it expires to avoid any complications.

For more information on this law, and when it comes into effect, please visit the Canadian Firearms Centre (CFC) at http://www.cfc-cafc.gc.ca   You can also notify the CFC of an address change or verify they have your correct address on this site.

If you have any questions, please contact my Constituency Office in Cranbrook (250) 417-2250 or 1-800-668-5522