Australia: Results
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AUSTRALIA: The Results Are In!
 
Updated Information!
 10/12/99 - BBC News announces: Same Story in the UK (they ban guns too)
09/29/99 - Updated with links to Australian Government Data!

(This report originally published November 1998)

  
Keith Tidswell 		The following is the NRAWinningTeam.com synopsis of an interview conducted by NRA-Live's Ginny Simone with Keith Tidswell of Australia's Sporting Shooters Association. The entire RealAudioŽ interview is available as "Australia Gun Ban Results" in the "Archive News" section of NRA's new. fully Multi-Media-based web site...

http://www.nralive.com/
  
Ginny Simone

    

One year after gun-owners were forced to surrender 640,381 personal firearms, including semi-automatic .22 rifles and shotguns, to be destroyed in a government program costing over 500 million dollars, the results are in...

The latest crime statistics reveal a dramatic increase in criminal activity. Gun control advocates respond "Just wait... we'll be safer... you'll see...".

Unfortunately, the ban has made the Australian criminal safer now.

 

OBSERVABLE FACT AFTER 12 MONTHS OF DATA
 


  • Australia-wide, homicides are up 3.2%.

  • Australia-wide, assaults are up 8.6%.

  • Australia-wide, armed-robberies are up 44%. (yes, FORTY-FOUR PERCENT)

  • In the state of Victoria, homicides-with-firearms are up 300%!

  • The steady decrease in homicides-with-firearms that occurred during the previous 25 years became an increase in the last 12 months.

  • The steady decrease in armed-robbery-with-firearms that occurred during the previous 25 years became an increase in the last 12 months.

  • There has been a dramatic increase in breakins-and-assaults-of-the-elderly.

  • At the time of the ban, the Prime Minister said "self-defense is not a reason for owning a firearm".

  • From 1910 to present, homicides in Australia have averaged about 1.8-per-100,000 or lower, a safe society by any standard.

  • The ban has destroyed Australia's standings in some international sport shooting competitions.

  • The membership of the Australian Sports Shooting Association has increased by 200% in response to the ban and in an attempt to organize against further controls, which are expected.

  • Australian politicians are on the spot and at a loss to explain why no improvement in "safety" has been observed after such monumental effort and expense was successfully expended in "ridding society of guns". Their response has been to "wait longer".


 
"...The best organization you've got there, the biggest organization you've got there is the NRA. We don't have an organization that size. We didn't have an organization that size, and as a consequence, we suffered. And we hope that you don't suffer..."

Keith Tidswell
Sporting Shooter's Association

9/29/99 UPDATE: Data from the Australian government publication
Firearm-related Violence: The Impact of the Nationwide Agreement on Firearms...



Notice the steady decrease until the gun ban?
Notice the upswing from 1997 on?

"...there has been a decline in firearm-related deaths in 1997, mostly due to a decline in the rate of suicides and accidents... There is also preliminary evidence that in some cases, for example suicide and armed robbery, firearms may be being displaced by other methods or weapons..."
-- Summary from Report Main Page

Does this sound like effective Crime Control?

10/12/99 - BBC News reports: Crime is doing GREAT in the UK!

Highlights from the BBC News Article

  • "...The crime rate is expected to soar for the first rise in five years when official figures are published this week..."

  • "...The new figures will also show an overall rise in violence and street crime, particularly in London, where violent crimes rose by more than 160%..."

  • "...In some areas of the capital, street crime has risen by more than 20%..."

  • "... One of the highest increases in recorded crime will be in the Dyfed Powys police area in Wales, where the new figures show an increase in robberies of 27% and a 43% rise in car thefts..."

  • "...violent crime has also risen by more than 60% in Kent..."

  • "...mainly due to a new method of counting crimes ... However... the figures produced by the old method... will also show a rise in crime..."

(NRAMembersCouncils.com recently received an email from the UK.)

Click here for other NRAWinningTeam synopses like this one.