ACT MP and Associate Minister of Justice (Firearms), Nicole McKee. File photo. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
The ACT Party has formally invoked its "agree to disagree" clause in its coalition agreement with National over the firearms registry.
ACT MP and Associate Minister of Justice (Firearms), Nicole McKee, said earlier this months she asked Cabinet to consider that the recent review of the firearms registry did not meet the commitment in ACT's coalition agreement, and asked for a more thorough and independent review be conducted in the 2025/26 financial year.
She said those proposals were rejected by National.
McKee also said she sought Cabinet agreement to delay the upcoming "activating circumstance" that would apply to ammunition purchases from June 2025.
"There is currently no clear definition of ammunition in the legislation, creating confusion. Pushing back the date to December 2026 would have provided time to build public trust in the registry and ensure clarity in the law. This recommendation was also rejected," said McKee.
She said the ACT-National coalition agreement includes a commitment to review the firearms registry to determine whether it is effectively improving public safety, and she said the review conducted fell short of that.
"The purpose of the review was to establish a clear evidence base, covering public safety impacts, government costs, compliance burdens for licensed firearms owners, and international comparisons. In my view, the review failed to deliver on these objectives," said McKee.
Although the review acknowledged there was limited data available to assess the registry's impact, it makes only limited use of domestic data, such as enforcement trends before the registry or the experience of the 20 percent of license holders already registered. Nor did it meaningfully examine international examples that could have provided further insight."
She said these were not gaps in available information, but instead in the analysis undertaken.
"One of the key conclusions - that the registry is justified if it prevents just two fatalities a year - is speculative and unsupported by evidence.
"Without a clear model of risk reduction or causal link to public safety outcomes, that claim is difficult to defend."
McKee said the review focused on operational costs to the government, but gave little weight to the compliance costs for firearms owners or the cost of a dealer's registry.
She said it also did not consider privacy concerns.
McKee said, despite the differences on the registry, the coalition partners continue to work constructively together on the rewrite of the Arms Act.
The police minister said he did not agree with ACT's push for a review of the firearms review.
Mark Mitchell said ACT had told National of its plan to criticise the review.
He said he saw no need to conduct a further review of the review.
"The review was commissioned under the Associate Minister for Justice, which is Nicole McKee, who was able to put the terms of reference together. We've had a review.
"We feel very strongly that we don't need another review on the review. It came out with some findings for us and some advice for us as government and and we don't agree that we need to have another second review."
Mitchell said they were both focused on improving public safety, and were working well together.
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