“In general, they are actually slowly being made better. The laws are getting less restrictive over time. It’s a slow process, but there is progress.”
Glad to hear it. I hope that this lever action shotgun nonsense is derailed.
I have heard that there is a movement to put all pump-action rifles, lever action rifles and shotguns, and straight pull bolt actions in the same category as semi-autos.
Perhaps you can comment on that.
Perhaps you can comment on that.
There is such a movement, but I'd be very surprised if it succeeds. There are people who want to increase restrictions, but that proposal has been floating around since at least 2008.
It's more likely more guns will be moved from Category C to Category B, than the other way around - in other words, the laws will be relaxed rather than tightened.
For that to happen though, we need to avoid turning this into a hot button issue. That's when we get overreactions and the anti-gun lobby wins. Keep things calm and balanced, and we tend to get things rolled back.
It all comes down to politics.
Part of the reason is that the former Australian government small arms factory at Lithgow was privatized [thought to be unneeded, since the Australian F88 rifles are polymer Steyr variants] and repurposed into a maker of rifles for the civilian market. This included the lever-action Winchester shotgun copy made popular by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator II film and other Hollywood shoot-em-ups, and a stainless version of the M1 Garand receiver, now out of production.
It is not enough for the anti-gun forces in Oz, which included a former PM, to just get the firearms out of production and out of the hands of the people. They want the factory that produced them to be leveled as well.