Bondi terror shooting sparks new gun reform measures
An entire generation of young Australians will not even know what happened in 1996, when Martin Bryant slaughtered 35 people in Tasmania at the infancy of John Howard’s government.
It is possible the gun law reforms – which included a crackdown on semiautomatic assault rifles – that followed Bryant’s killing spree helped limit the carnage at Bondi, unbelievable as this may seem. This is because the alleged chief Bondi shooter’s high-powered rifle had a manual bolt-action mechanism, instead of being a semiautomatic, or self-loading weapon.
A bolt-action firearm can be used quickly, but not to the extent that military-grade, automatic and semiautomatic rifles can be abused.
The intricacies regarding what guns were used in Sunday’s attack, and how they were used will become clearer after the police investigation, but it seems obvious that the shootings were the outcome of a high-powered rifle or rifles and a shotgun or shotguns.
The 50-year-old killer, now dead, was licensed with six weapons, according to police, highlighting the gaps that have emerged in firearms regulation in Australia.
No city dweller, least of all a wayward fruit shop owner, needs six firearms and this is where old-fashioned Australian commonsense needs to kick in.
There are now more guns in Australia than when Bryant wreaked havoc at Port Arthur and a vast shadowland of illegal weapons has emerged, with an unknown number of firearms washing through the underworld.
In recent times, 3D-printed firearms have become a reality, with suspected police shooter Dezi Freeman having allegedly used a makeshift shotgun when two officers were shot dead in Victoria in August.
The Howard gun law reforms created the infrastructure for which any legislative overhaul is likely to follow.
It will take Anthony Albanese and state and territory leaders’ courage to eat further into the blowout in gun ownership.
Of greatest concern will be the necessity, or otherwise, of people being allowed access to the highest-powered rifles available, used by the likes of deer hunters and pig shooters. Few need these weapons.
While there is a demonstrated need for farmers and others to use them, the political classes could do worse than start looking at who – and how many – of these high-powered firearms are circulating.
To that end, another gun amnesty seems an obvious place to start, bringing to mind images of firearms being crushed in vast numbers as law-abiding owners submitted to the post-Port Arthur process.
The gun lobby is highly influential, particularly in the outer suburbs of the major cities, but Bondi will diminish the power in any debate.
With more than four million guns reportedly in Australia, a decent clean-out won’t hurt anyone.
The positive is that the 1996 infrastructure will make the task easier than it might otherwise have been.
The lesson of Port Arthur was that the quicker the reforms, the better the results.
Australia has a proud history of gun law reform after the Port Arthur massacre; the Bondi atrocity must trigger another wave of change.