Dear Editor The recently-announced national gun buyback is a distraction from the actual problem of terrorism, and an unfair attack on Australia’s approximately 1 million firearms owners, who are rightfully dissatisfied with the Government’s response to this situation. Premier Chris Minns has said, “Fewer dangerous guns in our community means a safer New South Wales.” Of course, as freedom-loving Aussies, we all value living peacefully in safe communities, and we hate to hear about tragedies like what happened at Bondi, however the gun buyback will not really be removing “dangerous” guns from “off the streets”, as our Prime Minister also phrased it. Instead, the new policies will declare securely stored, legally owned sporting, pest control and hunting firearms to be “dangerous guns”, and then those guns, now deemed supremely hazardous and illegal, will be taken out of safes by regular law-abiding citizens, and handed over for what is for many people going to be insufficient financial compensation compared to what their guns are actually worth. There are already laws in place restricting the ownership of firearms by violent criminals, and indeed the vast majority of gun owners have no violent or terroristic intentions with their firearms. Obviously some policies need to be changed in response to that horrific terrorist attack, but they should focus on restricting criminals, not responsible gun owners, from accessing firearms - stronger background checks seems like an excellent place to start. Guns can be used completely safely by law-abiding citizens; they become dangerous in the hands of evil people. Emma Baker, Parkes
