Federal Government clayUN ransom A pilot project to compensate for legal owners who apply in prohibited firearms, faces counteracting the Cape Breton, New York, where it is deployed.
“They forced us to raise us in a corner,” says John Campbell, the owner of The Bullet Box, a shopping store store and a covered ridge in Sydney, Cape Breton.
Campbell began his business six years ago from a passion for sports shooting.
Now he says that his six -year business is faced with closing.
“When you have an inventory, in fact, frozen and say that you cannot sell it, but still we still had to pay, it is destructive. It is very difficult to return, ”he says.
He says that the firearms, which was its best sellers, especially for competitive target shooters, is currently in the federal list of 2500 guns, which were classified as prohibited weapons.
Campbell claims that the lack of understanding of weapons is part of the problem.
“You cannot just buy firearms, there is a big process for their possession,” he explains, ““[Ottawa has] We left after those people, we are not a problem here with weapons crime. ”
But the government says that there should not be anyone -libs of hand in a prohibited list.
“We are talking about public safety and the safety of our communities and providing protection to prevent further Victimization and violence tragedy with the use of weapons,” said the head of the Regional Police, Cape Breton Robert Walsh, at the press conferences of Ottawa.
Strength is one of the handfuls in the country that agreed to help the federal government in a pilot project to check its program compensation in the attack style (ASFCP).
Get daily national news
Get the main news of the day, political, economic and current headlines delivered to your mailbox once a day.
The program offers weapons owners money for the transfer or disconnecting of weapons in the list, with compensation listed in the amount of from $ 150 to more than $ 9,900, depending on the brand and model.
Participants can register and agree on a meeting in order to abandon their firearms at the Cape Breeton regional police service, or provide them with disconnected weapons, which will provide evidence of the service.
Federal officials say that hunters and sports arrows can instead use one of 19,000 legal tools that are still available in Canada.
According to the Regional Police Service of the Cape Breton, the public security of Canada has already received some registrations and submission to the program, and processed and processed. The goal of the pilot is to take 210 guns to develop any bends in the process.
But even before the program officially launched its online portal on October 1, the owners of the weapon in Cape Breton organized it against it. About 100 people rallied in front of the headquarters of the Keip -Breton police on Thursday, and in the town hall that evening released the same amount.
Rally participants and the owner of the weapon Mel Hawley do not own any of the prohibited firearms, but they are worried that his shotguns may be as follows.
“Instead of working with us, we always seem to be in Loggerheads with the federal government,” he says.
The statement of the hunter Darlin Leblank does not believe that the ban will help prevent violence with the use of weapons, calling him the “government of overwork.”
“To allow the crime to continue on our streets with illegally obtained firearms, why are they followed by legal weapons?” She asks.
“I am not interested in participating in something like that,” says weapon owner Simon Evis. “The policy that they chose mainly does nothing to reduce the crime for weapons and increase public safety.
“I will think about it before giving them,” says Simon Lee Sports Sports Arrive. “Because the matter is complete nonsense.”
Local organizers brought a representative of the Canadian coalition for firearms, as well as conservative deputy Blain Kalkins for events. Both called on the participants not to convey any firearms.
“We are here, on the Cape Breton, to inform the good people of the Cape Breton that they do not need to be the goal of their deputy and the chief of the police, and they do not need to participate in this pilot project, ”says Tracy Wilson, Vice President of Public Relations in the firearms group.
Critics at both events argued that the projected cost of the program of $ 756 million would be better to spend on a stop of illegal firearms in the country.
“Why do we spend three quarters of a billion dollars on this program?” Says Kalkin, who is also a critic of the party for hunting, fishing and preservation.
The perception of the program was also damaged the day before it was announced when the sound of a conversation with the participation of the Minister of Public Security Gary Anandasangari was leaked to the public. In Audio, Anandasangaree suggested that he would have dealt with this in the other wayIf you give a chance.
Political scientist of the University of Cape Breuton Tom Urbanyak says that the pilot project is in the focus of attention.
“This could not be the worst situation from the point of view of public relations for the minister,” he says.
“Critics of politicians considered the pilot as some opportunity not only to attract local attention, but also by national attention.”
Urbanyak does not think that the government will retreat.
“But where there can be any discussion, even in the liberal meeting is around some parts in terms of compensation,” he explains, “or if the conclusion is that the pilot really did not have time, whether there was any grandfather’s mechanism.”
The amnesty within the program ends in October 2026, before the storage of firearms becomes a criminal offense.
