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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Gun owners feel betrayed by continued federal registry

By: Bruce Cheadle

Posted: 10/23/2012 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

OTTAWA -- Seven months after the federal long-gun registry was repealed in every province but Quebec, a small but vocal faction of gun owners is feeling deeply betrayed by the Conservative government.

A registry of gun owners -- if not their specific weapons -- remains in force under federal licensing provisions that were part of the same 1995 Liberal gun control bill so loathed by the gun lobby. It's a reality to which some sport shooting enthusiasts are just waking up.

Lloyd, a retiree in Uxbridge, Ont., said he was shocked to find a licence renewal form in his mail this summer after celebrating the official April 6 end of the federal registry.

He's written to a Conservative MP and a cabinet minister seeking an explanation, and so far is without a response.

"I'm not planning to renew it," said Lloyd, who asked that his full name not be published because he's about to become an unlicensed gun owner.

"As far as I'm concerned, it's not the law right now.... I know I'm not alone."

Lloyd is indeed not alone.

A Saskatoon-based organization called the Canadian Unlicensed Firearms Owners Association has been taking the fight straight to Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, whose portfolio includes the RCMP and the Canada Firearms Centre.

"Your duplicity in dealing with firearms owners seems to know no bounds," Edward Hudson, the unlicensed group's secretary, thundered in the opening line of a May 9 letter to Toews.

His office did not respond to an interview request.

RCMP spokesman Sgt. Greg Cox confirmed in an email "everyone who possesses or acquires a firearm must still be licensed to do so, whether the firearm falls into the non-restricted, restricted or prohibited class."

-- The Canadian Press

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition October 23, 2012 A12

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