W.A. new 5 & 10 firearm limits

[Oldbloke]

So, thought I'd try this thread again. These are important new changes that effect all WA shooters.

W.A. intends to limit LAFO to 5 for hunting and 10 for target.

Hopefully this one doesn't get deleted.

Let's keep it polite gents.


https://sportingshooter.com.au/news/wa- ... -shooters/

[deye243]

Flogging a dead horse

[animalpest]

Sooo, if you were limited to 5 hunting firearms, what would be your top picks?

[bladeracer]

Sooo, if you were limited to 5 hunting firearms, what would be your top picks?

.22LR bolt-rifle
12ga. under/over gun
.223Rem bolt-rifle
7mm-08 bolt-rifle
Some sort of milsurp - M38 6.5x55mm, M1903-A3 .30-06, or Kar98k 8x57mm.

[animalpest]

Good choices. Mine would be similar, with the 7/08 replaced with my 25/06 and milsurp replaced with .308 or upwards

[Tomotron]

To all shooters in WA, please sign this Legislative Council e-petition. Please share around with your mates.
https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/Parlia ... A6000C3E34

[northdude]

Watching all this with intrest. Our clown show will be watching looking for ideas. Wonder how many firearms the crims will be limited to

[deye243]

Watching all this with intrest. Our clown show will be watching looking for ideas. Wonder how many firearms the crims will be limited to

This is proof that laws work

20230524_160414_copy_1024x693.jpg (191.2 KiB) Viewed 742 times

[Over The Hill]

After today's school incident I expect the old subject of centralised firearm storage will be back on the agenda

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-24/ ... /102387452

Public wont be trusted to keep their firearms secure

[Larry]

I have seen an increase in the sale of the Higher Power rifles on the market from WA on Used Guns. I bet this will cause an even further increase perhaps push prices down on some good rifles. Not nice to profit from someone else's misfortune.

[S O K A R]

Might be time to consider some of the multi-caliber options around, albeit not cheap but its a way around this stupid ruling.

[animalpest]

I have seen an increase in the sale of the Higher Power rifles on the market from WA on Used Guns. I bet this will cause an even further increase perhaps push prices down on some good rifles. Not nice to profit from someone else's misfortune.

So on another thread on this forum, someone said a gun store in WA sent 1000 firearms east because of the new laws coming in. Seriously, they are flogging guns to people that they know will be banned? Is "misfortune" the poor buyer who paid for a rifle that the gunshop knew was going to be banned? And did the said gunshop know this but just wanted the sale?

[bladeracer]

Might be time to consider some of the multi-caliber options around, albeit not cheap but its a way around this stupid ruling.

Some states already require registering spare barrels. In Qld you need a permit for individual chamber adapters apparently. It would be easy for WA to do the same thing.

The easiest way around it is probably something like a .30-06 and a wide variety of bullet types and weights, including sabots and sub-caliber bullets...but in WA it is already illegal to own .224" bullets if you only own a .30-06 rifle. You could load 100gn bullets down to subsonic levels to do everything you would want to use a .22LR for, up to high velocities for plinking bunnies at 400m, as well as 240gn bullets for the largest beasts...but WA is already talking about banning reloading.

The simplest answer if you enjoy shooting or owning firearms is don't live in WA.

I don't know if the kid today is licenced or is a shooter, but he definitely does not have legal access to a firearm or ammunition as a minor. He must've stolen it from somebody, and that owner will get hammered for it.

[deye243]

Might be time to consider some of the multi-caliber options around, albeit not cheap but its a way around this stupid ruling.

Some states already require registering spare barrels. In Qld you need a permit for individual chamber adapters apparently. It would be easy for WA to do the same thing.

The easiest way around it is probably something like a .30-06 and a wide variety of bullet types and weights, including sabots and sub-caliber bullets...but in WA it is already illegal to own .224" bullets if you only own a .30-06 rifle. You could load 100gn bullets down to subsonic levels to do everything you would want to use a .22LR for, up to high velocities for plinking bunnies at 400m, as well as 240gn bullets for the largest beasts...but WA is already talking about banning reloading.

The simplest answer if you enjoy shooting or owning firearms is don't live in WA.

I don't know if the kid today is licenced or is a shooter, but he definitely does not have legal access to a firearm or ammunition as a minor. He must've stolen it from somebody, and that owner will get hammered for it.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-24/ ... /102387452

[bigrich]

After today's school incident I expect the old subject of centralised firearm storage will be back on the agenda

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-24/ ... /102387452

Public wont be trusted to keep their firearms secure

good lord ! a kid turning up at a school with guns and firing off a few shots ! not good for a whole lot of reasons . this incident is going to put some drive into gun law changes in WA

[bigrich]

Sooo, if you were limited to 5 hunting firearms, what would be your top picks?

i just noticed your in WA mate . if your a working professional culler , surely their would be exemptions .

as to picking five guns for field work , i've been looking at that already. purely from the point of view of having less $ sitting around in the safe , that are collector pieces or "toys" that i just don't use. i would refer to the chuck hawk article of "building a hunting rifle battery" , which is a sound way of rationalizing a usable firearms collection . having said that , i love my 24" octagon barrel 357 rossi . it's more a camp gun and plinker to me . i wouldn't want to get rid of it just because a beurocrat says i've got too many

[animalpest]

Sooo, if you were limited to 5 hunting firearms, what would be your top picks?

i just noticed your in WA mate . if your a working professional culler , surely their would be exemptions .

as to picking five guns for field work , i've been looking at that already. purely from the point of view of having less $ sitting around in the safe , that are collector pieces or "toys" that i just don't use. i would refer to the chuck hawk article of "building a hunting rifle battery" , which is a sound way of rationalizing a usable firearms collection . having said that , i love my 24" octagon barrel 357 rossi . it's more a camp gun and plinker to me . i wouldn't want to get rid of it just because a beurocrat says i've got too many

I am actually not sure if being a professional will allow increased nu.bers of firearms. The reality is that most so-called "professionals" are part-time kangaroo shooters where it is not their primary source of income. (There are a few exceptions).

And if all you are doing "professionally" is roos, how many firearms do you need for that? A .223 or whatever, a .243 for windy nights, a spare..

Now if you have contracts for shooting other pest species, that a different story !

[S O K A R]

Might be time to consider some of the multi-caliber options around, albeit not cheap but its a way around this stupid ruling.

Some states already require registering spare barrels. In Qld you need a permit for individual chamber adapters apparently. It would be easy for WA to do the same thing.

I know here in Tas they're not required to be registered like an action is, they just have to be recorded that you have them by your dealer which then gets passed onto firearm services.
So in theory if you had a blaser you could have every caliber from .22 to .500 and you wouldn't need to seek approval to do so, only the action in its original caliber that is registered.
This may change in the future, but that's how it is at the moment.

[bladeracer]

Might be time to consider some of the multi-caliber options around, albeit not cheap but its a way around this stupid ruling.

Some states already require registering spare barrels. In Qld you need a permit for individual chamber adapters apparently. It would be easy for WA to do the same thing.

I know here in Tas they're not required to be registered like an action is, they just have to be recorded that you have them by your dealer which then gets passed onto firearm services.
So in theory if you had a blaser you could have every caliber from .22 to .500 and you wouldn't need to seek approval to do so, only the action in its original caliber that is registered.
This may change in the future, but that's how it is at the moment.

Yes, here in Victoria, Police don't care how many barrels or chamber adaptors we have.

[deye243]

Might be time to consider some of the multi-caliber options around, albeit not cheap but its a way around this stupid ruling.

You just have to register the firearm for the biggest calibre that's what I had to do with my switch barrel
Some states already require registering spare barrels. In Qld you need a permit for individual chamber adapters apparently. It would be easy for WA to do the same thing.

I know here in Tas they're not required to be registered like an action is, they just have to be recorded that you have them by your dealer which then gets passed onto firearm services.
So in theory if you had a blaser you could have every caliber from .22 to .500 and you wouldn't need to seek approval to do so, only the action in its original caliber that is registered.
This may change in the future, but that's how it is at the moment.

Yes, here in Victoria, Police don't care how many barrels or chamber adaptors we have.

[bladeracer]

How do they define "biggest calibre"? I think all Aus Police forces consider "calibre" to be the chambering, not the bore diameter.

[dnedative]

Yes, here in Victoria, Police don't care how many barrels or chamber adaptors we have.

Similar in NSW; Nothing stopping you from buying barrels privately and even commercially, they just need to go through a dealer.
Through a dealer they get logged as a transaction but its no different from an ammunition sale. I could buy a random barrel for something and its off to the races I go.

The end user is probably supposed to advise the registry they have a different caliber barrel that might fit one of their firearms but I'll wager all the money in the world there are tens of thousands of barrels out there that the registry knows absolutely nothing about. They are spare parts until they are fitted and I dont think the police really give it any thought, when you apply for a PTA here you can use it for anything that's in that category, they dont care if its a 50BMG or a 22 Hornet, you can only use one barrel at a time so its much the same though process.

[NorthWester]

After today's school incident I expect the old subject of centralised firearm storage will be back on the agenda

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-24/ ... /102387452

Public wont be trusted to keep their firearms secure

good lord ! a kid turning up at a school with guns and firing off a few shots ! not good for a whole lot of reasons . this incident is going to put some drive into gun law changes in WA

McGowan already publicly stating they will accelerate the WA Gun Reforms now.

What gets me is that yesterdays incident will not be prevented with a reduction in firearms. The kid only needed one... However rationale doesn't apply to the politicians, they are more concerned with votes and their next term in parliament. Otherwise decisions would be based on facts rather than politically induced emotions.

Back onto the topic, they are stating we have approx. 360K licensed firearms in WA for approx. 80K shooters. So an average of 4.5 firearms per license holder.... If they introduce the 5 per hunting and 10 per competition, We could easily still have way more than 360K of firearms in WA.

In fact if we all found it too hard to continue with hunting, yet we wanted to still shoot, we could have 80K of shooters now shooting in competitions. Thats 800K of firearms in the community.... But I understand its all about divide and conquer too.

Then there is the argument for central storage, which could be made possible (with huge outlay, security and a massive admin cost) in metro areas, but totally impractical for rural or remote areas. That said it would be a target still, guns would be damaged and go missing, you would need to book out your firearm in advance and probably have to show you have permission to shoot on a property or registration to a particular event each time... Imagine the que's on a Friday afternoon.... What a nightmare... But hey they never think that far... sort of like the mental health checks.

Sorry went off topic again...

This sort of thing just drives people to go out and get what they can whilst they can... If it was like it was in other states we wouldn't hold onto unused firearms, as we could just get another in the future. In WA there is no way anyone with firearms will dispose of them until made to do so.

For nearly 10yrs I had a high powered rifle that sat in the safe unused. I didn't dispose of it because its simply too hard and too expensive to replace. But if I could pay a small fee and not jump through a million hoops to replace, then I would have disposed of it and upgraded when I required it again.

Maybe time to look for a job in another state....

[NorthWester]

Good choices. Mine would be similar, with the 7/08 replaced with my 25/06 and milsurp replaced with .308 or upwards

A man of my own heart.... 25/06 Not many of us around with them nowadays.

This was my windy night roo culling set up when I was in the northwest (and reloading components were so much cheaper!). Plus used for all other duties as directed by station management. Such a versatile cartridge. That said given powder costs and the impossible quest to get .257 projectiles, I'd probably go with the 7/08 or 6.5 Creed for ease of availability.

[bladeracer]

Yes, here in Victoria, Police don't care how many barrels or chamber adaptors we have.

Similar in NSW; Nothing stopping you from buying barrels privately and even commercially, they just need to go through a dealer.
Through a dealer they get logged as a transaction but its no different from an ammunition sale. I could buy a random barrel for something and its off to the races I go.

The end user is probably supposed to advise the registry they have a different caliber barrel that might fit one of their firearms but I'll wager all the money in the world there are tens of thousands of barrels out there that the registry knows absolutely nothing about. They are spare parts until they are fitted and I dont think the police really give it any thought, when you apply for a PTA here you can use it for anything that's in that category, they dont care if its a 50BMG or a 22 Hornet, you can only use one barrel at a time so its much the same though process.

I was told a few years ago that to own a spare barrel in NSW it had to be serial numbered so it could be recorded - is that correct?

[womble]

This is straight up communism.
I know that sounds extreme and like I’m having a rant.
But it is what it is.
They claim to represent the whole collectively, but the reality is they’re creating a totalitarian government.
Limiting consumer choice. You no longer have access to the free market , your freedom of choice. Free trade. You are already limited to older sub standard technology.
And it goes where it goes.
And it never ends well.
But next up comes the emergence of a black market.
This is very reckless and naive government and very disappointing to see in this country.

And it’s without reason. There’s no evidence to support exceeding those limits make a previously safe person a danger.
And no reasonable person would support that theory.
The state deemed you were not a risk to public safety when it granted you the privilege to possess firearms. If you are a risk with 6 you are still a risk with even 1
You should not have been permitted the first one by their logic.
Laws need to be based in reason. It’s important. The rule of law is the foundation of a free country.

[bigrich]

i can see some shooters in WA are going to consider moving east.

yeah womble , it's a form of communism , but WA has always leaned a bit that way. will it cut down on firearms offences , probably not . but the powers that be would never admit that to the public . i imagine with such a huge remote coastline it would be easy for crims to get guns brought into WA
.
the kid firing off a few shots around the school got lots of media coverage . i'm waiting for the drama from the eastern state anti's to start

[Larry]

Look on the bright side at least all those threads titled "if you could only have 5 guns what would they be" may be of some practical use now.

BR the serial no of a barrel and being registered is one of WA rules I believe. Dont think NSW has a similar rule.

[JohnV]

Look on the bright side at least all those threads titled "if you could only have 5 guns what would they be" may be of some practical use now.

BR the serial no of a barrel and being registered is one of WA rules I believe. Dont think NSW has a similar rule.

NSW does have extra barrel registration numbers if it's a chambered and threaded barrel that you wanted in another cartridge on the same action . If it's just a spare not fitted barrel then they don't seem to care . I have 243 and 308 registered for one action and 243 and 30-06 for another action . All four barrels have to have separate numbers stamped on them . If you just have the original barrel on an action in one cartridge then they don't want the barrel numbered .
You can get a Smith to fit a new barrel and he just destroys the old one .

[dnedative]

Yes, here in Victoria, Police don't care how many barrels or chamber adaptors we have.

Similar in NSW; Nothing stopping you from buying barrels privately and even commercially, they just need to go through a dealer.
Through a dealer they get logged as a transaction but its no different from an ammunition sale. I could buy a random barrel for something and its off to the races I go.

The end user is probably supposed to advise the registry they have a different caliber barrel that might fit one of their firearms but I'll wager all the money in the world there are tens of thousands of barrels out there that the registry knows absolutely nothing about. They are spare parts until they are fitted and I dont think the police really give it any thought, when you apply for a PTA here you can use it for anything that's in that category, they dont care if its a 50BMG or a 22 Hornet, you can only use one barrel at a time so its much the same though process.

I was told a few years ago that to own a spare barrel in NSW it had to be serial numbered so it could be recorded - is that correct?

https://www.police.nsw.gov.au/__data/as ... l_Form.pdf

So yeah, gunsmith/dealer supposed to fill that out when you change a barrel, how often it actually happens and how it works for interstate work I have no idea - If your only registering one barrel to a firearm you dont need to SN it or the now spare old one, given your replacing it and not ticking the additional barrel box it becomes an uncontrolled spare part.

The legislation doesn't match reality and its grey as grey gets - I get the impression 'additional barrels' is viewed as something only deemed a requirement for rifles with user switchable barrel systems, anything else your not supposed to work on yourself and they are just spare parts but your free to buy both as uncontrolled parts. A Blaser R8 barrel and a Mauser 98 barrel are the same thing when your buying and selling.

Its just another confusing thing I'm sure a lot of people are probably in breach of by no fault of their own.