Taking a break from my holidays to provide an update on a new announcement. Essentially, there were 2 firearms related policies announced. One was de-criminalizing the CZ858 and Swiss Arms rifles that are prohibited. This will provide a way for owners of these rifles to do something with them other than gaze at them longingly from their spot in the gun safe. The other piece of legislation is designed to curb some of the more annoying parts of existing firearms law. It’s a pretty conservative piece of legislation, should cut costs, and even throws a few bones to the other side by removing the option to challenge the tests (you have to go through the full course before doing the test, no challenging allowed.) Despite what is a really boring, just fix the total BS pieces, type of new legislation, opposing parties still looked at it as “reducing public safety” and similar rhetoric.
The new legislation is just a proposal for now, but it proposes:
- Combining PALs and POLs:
- No challenging the test. I challenged my RPAL, but that was mostly because all the RPAL courses were booked for 4 months solid. So long as courses are not overly restricted, this is fine.
- More strict domestic violence restrictions. Ambiguous, and I’m unsure what existing loophole/issue this fixes. People concerned about spouses can call in to the RCMP to raise a spousal safety concern as it is.
- Reduce CFO policy making. Not an issue here in Alberta, but I feel the pain from Quebec and Ontario hunters. Quebec is/was using basically every angle they could to limit and restrict firearms, so it’d be nice to get some consistency across the country.
- Combining ATT’s with RPAL. About time. No more faxing ATTs and bringing around printed sheets of paper to the range.
All in all, pretty conservative, pretty sane. Just a piece of legislation designed to cut some of the useless paperwork out of the system. The ATTs were bullshit and the inconsistent treatment of firearms owners between provinces sucked too. This legislation helps fix some of these issues.
For more info: https://www.facebook.com/sunnewsnetwork/photos/a.185172004858325.37088.182265978482261/766175743424612/?type=1&theater
