Firearms registry: Reducing gun crime, how licence holders are key

THREE KEY FACTS

• One in 20 Kiwis has a firearms licence.
• New Zealand currently has 231,000 active licence holders.
• The Firearms Registry was introduced as part of the response to the 2019 Christchurch mosque shootings.

When police went with a search warrant to a Mongrel Mob prospect’s home last November, the story was all too familiar. Along with a significant amount of cannabis, they found a rifle, shotgun and hundreds of rounds of ammunition. A recipe for harm.

But rather than police hitting the usual brick wall of silence about where the gang prospect got these firearms, the guns told their own story. The Firearms Safety Authority did a quick check of the serial numbers in New Zealand’s first digital Firearms Registry, which revealed who should have been in possession of them.

That person has now had their firearms licence suspended, all other firearms in their possession have been seized and they have been charged with the unlawful supply of firearms.

In the past we only had a partial picture

Gangs are using guns more and more. When police are out on our streets, they and the public are increasingly being confronted with guns. We needed to know that firearms are staying in the hands of law-abiding licence holders.

Before the Firearms Registry started in June 2023, there was a major gap in the system. The Firearms Safety Authority knew who held a firearms licence, but we didn’t know what guns each licence holder had in their homes or businesses. We didn’t know where or when these guns were being bought, sold and moved between people or if firearms were being stockpiled or getting into the hands of criminals.

Stopping the flow of guns to criminals

One of the common ways criminals get guns is by exploiting the system through “straw buyers”. This is where a licence holder buys guns to sell or pass on to criminals and gangs.

The police’s National Organised Crime Group has been successful at looking for suspicious patterns to identify straw buyers by analysing sales records. Before the registry, it meant manually entering hundreds of thousands of individual records.

Knowing when firearms are moving around means the small group of licence holders caught supplying criminals with guns will be charged. The registry is already helping detect these illegal transfers and sales.

Most licence holders want to do the right thing

At the end of January, a third (31%) of all active licence holders owned registered 345,000 firearms. Of the 72,000 licence holders registered to date, around 30% have done so proactively, without waiting for an event which requires them to, such as buying a new gun or shifting house. The registry is on track to contain all licence holders by the 2028 deadline set by Parliament.

The critics are wrong about tracing firearms

Those against the registry argue criminals are just rubbing off the identifying serial numbers, making the registry redundant. The best data available shows this is not the case.

In June 2024, the Firearms Safety Authority conducted a stock take of more than 7100 seized and surrendered firearms held in the armouries in police stations across the country. Of those firearms, more than two-thirds (69%) contained a serial number, 28% had no visible serial number (it should be noted that with some firearms, the serial number is present but not visible, for example, under the sight mount) and less than 3% had had the serial number removed.

Over the last 11 years, records show 7800 firearms were reported stolen, potentially ending up in the hands of criminals. The registry is improving the chance of firearms being recovered and increasing the motivation for licence holders to remain vigilant around the secure storage of their firearms.

Licence holders are vital to a robust system

Ultimately, the goal of a strong firearms system is to protect our communities from the harm caused by unregulated and illicit firearms use.

Close co-operation and interoperability between the Firearms Safety Authority and police is critical to improving public and frontline safety. Close collaboration between police who enforce the law, organisations like mine who act as the “regulator”, Customs, who protect our borders, intelligence agencies, who may become aware of people plotting mass harm, and firearms licence holders is essential.

We are all critical to making sure firearms are kept out of the hands of criminals and gangs.

By working together, our communities are safer from gun crime.