Firearms Minister Nicole McKee wants the gun registry gone – review says she should keep it

McKee has questioned whether the benefits are worth the costs – annual operating costs are estimated at $8.5 million – and remains concerned about the public safety impact of data breaches. These have happened previously and, in the wrong hands, could tell criminals where they can find certain guns.

She campaigned on axing the registry and has also talked about a return to the previous system where only certain firearms needed to be registered.

In an interview with the Herald, she wouldn’t confirm or deny the findings of the review, saying it still had to go through a Cabinet process. Asked if the review said something she didn’t like, she smiled, then laughed before adding: “It’s an interesting report.”

She said she would continue to push for what she campaigned on, which also includes widening access for military-style semi-automatic firearms (MSSAs) under strict conditions.

But as Opposition parties are against these changes, they require the support of both coalition parties to proceed, which McKee conceded may not happen.

The wider goal was to rewrite the Arms Act in a way that endured for decades, taking account of everyone’s views.

“One person alone cannot dictate for a whole country exactly how something should work, and not take on everybody else’s thoughts, concerns, advice,“ McKee said.

“The moment I do that, I become arrogant. So I don’t want to do that ... It’s not about me. It’s about having good firearms laws for everyone.”

The current ban on MSSAs means only about 300 commercial pest controllers can legally fire them.

McKee has supported widening their use, including for some recreational pest control, and for about 400 competitive shooters.

“It’s a very small number ... And when you look at the previous regime of having to have yearly checks, higher security – which means thicker safes – alarm systems to stop burglaries, it was quite intense.

“And they were all good people and they did well.”

She currently lacks the numbers in Parliament to make this change after National, which previously supported access for shooting competitions, changed its stance.

“They’ve made that quite clear. That’s fine,” McKee said.

“I want to see what the feedback is, which I haven’t received just yet [from consultation over the Arms Act].”

During the third leaders’ debate in the 2023 campaign, National Party leader Christopher Luxon said greater access to MSSAs was “not going to happen”.

He has refused to answer that question since taking office and agreeing (in the National-Act coalition agreement) to rewrite the Arms Act, which, among other things, will consider MSSAs.

The powerful firearms provoke strong reactions because of their association with mass shootings, including in Christchurch in 2019 and Aramoana in 1990.

Opponents of wider access argue the risk is too great: more of them in circulation means a greater chance of one falling into the wrong hands.

“These high-velocity firearms are capable of destroying humans with the most horrendous injuries. Fired at the right place, a head will disintegrate,” said Tim Ashton, a retired police officer who was on the front line during the Aramoana response.

Those events continue to haunt him, he told the Herald, and “it haunts me that 51 people died [in Christchurch] because successive governments did nothing”.

“And if we allow greater access to MSSAs, it will happen again.”

Ashton said he didn’t consider competitive shooting with MSSAs a sport.

“I consider it a minor inconvenience to not being able to get an assault rifle and go around and shoot some paper targets. If one life is lost, it’s one life too many.”

McKee believed the risks of wider access can be mitigated, though she conceded this was a hard sell from a public safety point of view.

“I’m not going to let my constituents down by not campaigning on their behalf ... That doesn’t necessarily mean we will get what we want.”

She said she remained open-minded and didn’t want to be “put in a corner” because of her previous advocacy.

“I didn’t think that was fair, especially to the Christchurch Muslim community, for them to have anxiety over thinking that I might do this.

“If I do end up putting it through, I have to think about – can I mitigate those risks and alleviate some of the fears from the community? And if I can’t, then I won’t.”

McKee and Act campaigned on scrapping the gun registry, but this didn’t make it into the National-Act coalition agreement. Instead, only a review was included.

Last year McKee argued in favour of what existed before the Christchurch terror attack, meaning all pistols and restricted weapons had to be registered.

But this didn’t exist in a form similar to the current registry, where the information can be searched and shared with frontline police officers in real-time. Nor did it have the same impact on gun owners selling firearms to the unlicensed, which criminals say the registry helps prevent.

McKee conceded the registry has advantages.

“The challenge we face is, is it worth the money? Well, not only is it worth the money, but how do we get compliance? Because people are so worried about their information being accessed.”

There were several privacy breaches in the early days of the FSA, the last major one in July 2023, according to a list compiled by the Council for Licensed Firearms Owners (Colfo).

“If the registry is going to stay in its format, then a lot of work needs to be done by Government to create trust and confidence in that regime,” McKee said.

According to FSA annual survey results, trust and confidence have significantly improved between 2022 and 2024:

McKee said this was good progress, adding: “At the moment, the digital registry we have complies with government security assurances. We need to get that out there a bit more.”

Colfo’s annual survey about trust and confidence in police also showed improvements, though scores remain very low.

Last year respondents scored police 1.9 out of 10 for administering the Arms Act without bias, and 1.3 out of 10 for keeping firearms registry data secure.

Moving the FSA out from police to another department is another way McKee hopes to boost trust and confidence.

She plans to push this through even if it costs hundreds of millions of dollars; a new IT system might be needed to maintain real-time information-sharing between the FSA and police.

Might there be more urgent matters the Government would rather spend money on?

“I am committed to doing it. It’s in the coalition agreement. It’s something that needs to be done," McKee said.

The rewritten Arms Act will also have new provisions about technology that didn’t exist when the current law was written, in 1983.

Police want a new offence for possessing blueprints for 3D-printed firearms and firearms parts; since 2018, police have seized 58 3D-printed guns and between 200 to 300 3D-printed firearms parts.

McKee noted the risks of 3D printing, but also saw opportunities for economic growth.

“I’ve just visited some commercial businesses who are making quite outstanding innovative stuff that no one else is doing in the world – very lightweight 3D-printed stocks ... that are on average half the weight of a normal stock.”

That could have huge benefits for the Defence Force or hunters, she said.

“We’ve got to stop criminals being able to access the plans ... but I reckon there will be a way of enabling it legally.”

She said public safety remained paramount and penalties needed to be sufficiently hefty to deter misuse of 3D printing.

“But I can’t just go banning everything because it potentially could be a public safety issue. At the end of the day, a car will have a public safety issue with it as well.

“It’s about finding that balance.”

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Derek Cheng is a senior journalist who started at the Herald in 2004. He has worked several stints in the press gallery team and is a former deputy political editor.