COHA DEMANDS END OF GUN REGISTRY
Date: Mar 19, 2005 7:31 AM
March 17, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

FROM: The Canadian Outdoor Heritage Alliance

SUBJECT: Funding to national firearms registry must be stopped immediately

COHA DEMANDS END OF GUN REGISTRY

Before the federal government sweeps the deaths of four, young RCMP officers
under the rug, questions must be raised about the federal firearms legislation that
blatantly allowed their deaths to happen.
While Prime Minister Paul Martin and his deputy sanctimoniously attended memorial
services for the slain Mounties and wiped their crocodile tears away, the Canadian
Outdoor Heritage Alliance (COHA), a national organization that represents 230,000
hunters, anglers, and trappers across the country, asked, “How could the Federal
Firearms Act with its publicized checks and controls have allowed a killer, with
a background of anti-social acts and illegal activities, to have a high-powered
rifle? These recent murders point out how flawed and pointless the legislation really
is.”
Jim Lawrence, Manager of Corporate Affairs and Communications for COHA, said,
“While honest gun owners across the country have been harassed and lumbered
with this ineffective, badly-written legislation, that the Liberals are touting
as the panacea for gun control, criminals have continued to use their illegal firearms
in an ever increasing crime spree, flouting both the intent and the word of the
law. Just look at the illegal gun problem in Toronto and now the shameful murder
of these four young RCMP officers. Isn’t this the reason the Liberals passed the
gun registry legislation? To stop crime? To save lives?
“It’s time the funding was stopped, the current, unworkable, ineffective
program ended, and the legislation rewritten by knowledgeable people to give Canada
sane, effective gun legislation.”
Lawrence added that since the legislation was introduced citizens’ committees,
police associations, police officers, Toronto’s Police Chief, members of the hunting
and trapping communities, and the federal Auditor General, have publicly stated
that the federal firearms registry must be abandoned as being both impotent and
a waste of taxpayers’ money.
“A farcical Liberal review of the legislation, promised in the last election,
resulted in more wasted dollars and the official position that the law was both
wonderful and effective. While the Coalition for Gun Control has publicly stated
the law will save lives, Canadians are faced daily with shootings and murders, committed
with unregistered guns, and most recently the deliberate murder of four of Canada’s
young people who were members of an internationally respected police force.
Lawrence concluded, ” This legislation must be scrapped. It does nothing
but intimidate and regulate lawful gun owners, who use their firearms for legal
purposes, while allowing criminals to use their illegal guns to rob, rape, and murder
Canadians from coast to coast.
“Why won’t the government admit their error and end this travesty now?”

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For more information contact Jim Lawrence, COHA, Manager: Corporate Affairs and
Communications: 613-397-1157