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Politics : Canadian Political Free-for-All -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Gulo who wrote (4959)	5/4/2005 2:25:34 AM
From: fresc	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 37571

I was quoting the NRA in America( It's my right.....) How gun Registry may be actually starting to work... Canada's gun-control program is a success: More than 2 million firearm owners (90 per cent) are now licensed and almost 7 million firearms (85 per cent) are registered. More than 9,000 people have been denied firearm licences under the new program. Police officers use the system more than 1,500 times a day and report many cases where the system has allowed them to remove guns from people who were a risk to themselves or others. Canada's laws do not prevent people from using firearms responsibly, but they do increase accountability Because of the virulent opposition of the gun lobby, the firearms program has been subjected to a burden of proof absent from other public-policy debates. Nevertheless, the facts, when accurately reported, speak for themselves. Firearm death, robbery and injury rates are the lowest they've been for more than 30 years. While it is too early to assess the impact of the licensing and registration system, the results are encouraging, particularly where rifles and shotguns are concerned Public-interest test: Police, public-health officials and groups representing victims of violence continue to support the law. According to the last Environics poll, three-quarters of Canadians continue to support licensing gun owners and registering guns, despite the controversy. In Quebec, the levels of support are the highest in the country - 85 per cent. While it is true only 45 per cent of gun owners support the legislation, 77 per cent of people living with gun owners support it. Role-of-government test: Governments have a duty to protect their citizens from harm and to regulate dangerous products. The United Nation's Special Rapporteur on Human Rights has said countries that fail to protect their citizens adequately from firearms through effective regulation might be failing their obligations under international Human Rights Law. Value-for-money-test: The introduction of the new program has required significant investment to address gaps identified in the old system. In spite of the rhetoric, two-thirds of the money was spent on screening and licensing gun owners, not on registering guns. The old system cost approximately $30 million a year to operate. The new system will cost $70 million a year, but public-safety experts maintain it is a good investment. The costs of firearm injuries and deaths have been estimated at $6.6 billion a year, more than $1.5 billion in Quebec alone. Affordability test: It's difficult to measure the benefits of prevention programs, until it is too late. More than 1,000 people die every year in Canada as a result of guns, compared with 3,000 killed in automobile crashes. The costs of Canada's firearms program are dwarfed by the money governments invest in trying to keep our highways and roads safe. The government spent almost half a billion dollars to widen a New Brunswick highway after 43 people died over five years. Over the same period, more than 5,000 Canadians were killed with guns. The question is not can we afford to license gun owners and register guns, but can we afford not to.