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So finally the federal Liberal government has conceded defeat in the fight against legal gun owners.

It has, in what appears to be a rare brush with fact and reality, decided that gun law reform is not a platform topic that it will pursue.

Both Minister Bill Blair and Ralph Goodale are licking their wounds after having to concede that data and common sense dictate that a gun ban at any level of government will achieve absolutely nothing in the prevention of gun crime and violence perpetrated primarily by criminals, gangs and drug dealers with illegally acquired and possessed firearms.

In my most monotonous voice I say: What. A. Shocker.

There was some language however that is still troubling in that the Liberals still think that giving more power to municipalities to handle such matters would be a feasible solution…

But here’s the rub; if the City of Toronto, Montreal or any municipality was empowered by The FIrearms Act, The Canadian Firearms Program to band ammunition and guns – of any classification – they would be creating criminals out of many of their citizens. Those otherwise law abiding citizens would be forced to move, sell or relocate their firearms and be responsible for their security but be potentially quite a distance away from them which actually causes more public safety issues.

Placing such onerous and unfair requirements on the law-abiding is equally as brainless as Bill C-71 was and any other discussion stemming therefrom.

In the same breath however the Ministers then also state that even giving such power to municipalities will not have any impact on public safety for the better as they have already conceded will not work.

Creating such municipal powers would be costly from an enforcement standpoint since the estimated $2 billion it would cost to buy-up (not “buy back”) restricted class firearms is high enough, never mind bolstering Law Enforcement resources.

One then has to beg the question – where does that money come from?

If the government is willing to consider spending $2 billion on gun buy-ups, then why not spend a lot – or actually ALL – of that on more border security resources and a huge sum of that on the RCMP and all its divisions and required resources?

That seems to be a far better use of tax dollars.

The Feds already pledged $327 million in November of 2018 and have only spent one-quarter of that amount with most of it going to the CBSA and very little to the RCMP who oversees a huge amount of policing in the country as well as operates the Canadian Firearms Program and has labs and resources closed due to funding deficiencies.

For now reason has prevailed. For now.

But rest assured that there is also a burning ember that could spark fire at any time. But until the Federal Liberals – and future governments of any stripes – get serious on proper and sustained funding of law enforcement federally and all the way down to the city level as well as our borders, then this problem will reach a point of serious issue and firearms owners will start to seriously discuss the topic of legal self-defence and the right to carry a concealed firearm to that end (after an extensive vetting process in excess of their licensing requirements), but on that topic I digress…at least for now.

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