New Zealand police no longer involved in gun licensing

New Zealand's government will end the involvement of police officers in regulating gun ownership, an official said as she announced sweeping firearms law reforms.

The move is intended to ease tensions between the gun regulator and firearms owners, which have been fraught since the agency's creation following a shooting massacre at two New Zealand mosques.

The Firearms Safety Authority has overseen gun ownership since 2022 after an inquiry underlined the way the white supremacist attacker legally acquired numerous weapons without attracting law enforcement scrutiny.

A near-total ban on semiautomatics are to stay.

The changes unveiled in Wellington by Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee stopped short of what the police union and those bereaved in the Christchurch massacre feared: a reversal of the near-complete ban on semiautomatic firearms passed after the attacker killed 51 Muslims at prayer on March 15, 2019.

McKee, a lobbyist for gun owners before she entered parliament in 2020, told reporters her bid to relax the semiautomatic weapons ban for some sports shooters wasn't approved by the Cabinet. Her government had refused to rule out reversing the ban before.

Instead, her changes focused on removing uniformed officers from the regulatory body and altering its oversight. Once McKee's law passes, the authority will report directly to the government, rather than the head of the New Zealand Police.

"There will be no blue shirts in the Firearms Safety Authority," McKee said, referring to police uniforms. The 15 officers who worked at the authority would return to police duties, which will still include enforcing gun crime laws.

"We need to rebuild the trust and confidence between the regulator and the licensed firearms community that has diminished severely over the past six years," said McKee. She said "a lot of the blame" for the Christchurch attack was directed at gun owners, who say police should be focusing on law enforcement, not on regulation compliance or licensing.

The regulator is currently a unit within the police department. The law change would create a more independent legal structure that would only share corporate services with the law enforcement agency.

The body couldn't be entirely separated from the police department due to a reliance on law enforcement databases, McKee said.

The Australian attacker, who moved to New Zealand to carry out the massacre, was granted a license and legally amassed semiautomatic weapons after being radicalised online.

Tarrant pleaded guilty in 2020 to a terrorism charge, 51 counts of murder and 37 of attempted murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

"None of us want to see that again," McKee said. But she said the swift changes in the attack's aftermath were "rushed, confused and unfair."

New Zealand drew global admiration when its then-Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said six days after the massacre that the weapons used would be banned. Further reforms included new gun club rules and a firearms registry.

A spokesperson for the Council of Licensed Firearms Owners, which McKee previously led, said the group welcomed the removal of police from gun licensing. Hugh Devereux-Mack said the structure of the regulator had resulted in "unfair and intimidating treatment" of gun owners.