There is little hope the government’s second wave of firearms law reforms are going to achieve bi-partisan support.

I had absolutely no problem outlawing military-style semi-automatics and assault rifles. But this latest tranche of reforms is picking on law-abiding people, when the focus should be laser-like on smashing the perpetrators of gun crime.

The hardcore crims, the reprobates, the gangs. That scum bag who hijacked a police car at gunpoint in Ohakune on Saturday is such a specimen.

What’s the point in halving the licence duration from ten years to five years, when the overwhelming numbers of firearms offences are committed without a licence?

How will a gun register dramatically make us safer, when registering your dog or your car is routinely flouted by the feckless and the lawless?

It’s only the responsible, compliant and law-abiding firearms owners who will suffer. Why should they have to pay the price?

And expecting gun clubs to go through an onerous approval and cert-if-ication process looks heavy-handed. Some will simply shut down.

This all reeks of mis-directed over-reach. Lay off the law-abiding.

I’m a huge fan of the Australian-style Firearms Prohibition Orders. FPOs. Just as New South Wales has done, FPOs should be slapped on our growing ranks of gang members.

The orders ensure gang members cannot hold a firearms licence and give the police enhanced search and seizure powers, on gang members with serious form. Anywhere, anytime search powers– without the need for a court-ordered warrant.

Parliament had the chance to pass this legislation last year, but Labour and the Greens shot it down, on the grounds that it would breach their human rights. FPOs are precisely what the police need in their arsenal to take the fight to organised crime groups, the gangs and serious violent offenders.

Remind me again how many firearms gangland has voluntarily surrendered since March fifteen? That’s right. The square root of naff all. Zero.

Stuart Nash was a fan of FPOs, but he’s parked the issue up for further contemplation. That’s not good enough. FPOs should be front and centre of these reforms.