Correcting the Record.
“The gun buyback can work” — the claim that doesn’t stack up.
On 31 August, The Point — an initiative of The Australia Institute — published an article arguing that NSW’s gun laws are “already working” and that the ACT and other jurisdictions “only need to follow NSW’s lead.” Its centrepiece claim is contradicted by the NSW Firearms Registry’s own published rules. Here is the correction — and why it matters for the ACT.
What the article claims
The article points to real NSW Police figures — firearm dealer sales roughly halved since December, permit-to-acquire (PTA) applications down from about 7,000 a month to 5,000, and registered firearm numbers falling — and presents them as proof the laws are “already working.” It then urges the ACT and others to “follow NSW’s lead.” We do not dispute the figures. We dispute what they are made to mean — and one claim of fact in particular.
The claim that is simply wrong
The article’s key line is this:
“The decline in gun numbers comes despite the fact that NSW’s new ownership limits — of ten guns per person for most licences and four for hunters — have not yet come into effect.”
That is contradicted by the NSW Firearms Registry’s own PTA guidance on the NSW Police “Gun Safe” portal. The very numbers the article names are already operating at the point of acquisition:
“The limit which is immediately effective for the purposes of PTA applications is 10 firearms” (four for recreational hunting/vermin control; no limit for dealers and collectors).
“PTA applications that would cause a licence holder to exceed those limits will not be issued and will be taken to have never been made. No refund will be provided.”
A PTA also cannot be issued unless the Registrar is satisfied you meet safe-storage requirements — a passed inspection is required before the application progresses.
The article’s phrase “have not yet come into effect” trades on an equivocation. What has not yet commenced is the possession side — there is “no immediate seizure of firearms for those currently above the new limits.” But the acquisition side — the 10/4 caps applied to new permits — is, on the Registry’s own words, already in force. So the fall in permits the article celebrates is not happening “despite” the limits; it is the direct, mechanical result of those limits already being enforced at the permit stage. The article uses the possession-side meaning to imply the acquisition caps are doing nothing — when the acquisition caps are precisely what produced its charts.
“Working” means fewer guns — not less harm
Set the factual error aside, and a deeper problem remains. The article measures success as fewer guns, fewer sales and fewer permits — measures of the policy’s own restrictive activity, not of public safety. It never connects a reduction in lawful ownership to any reduction in crime, injury or death. Licensed sporting firearms held in approved storage are not the source of most firearm crime, which overwhelmingly involves illicit, unregistered firearms. “Fewer guns among licence-holders” is not shown to touch that at all. And the projected buyback figure the article leans on — “up to 274,000” — is a ceiling for a scheme that had not yet begun. A maximum projection is not a result.
The same author — a pattern, not a one-off
The article is by Skye Predavec, a researcher at the Australia Institute — which publishes The Point and holds a declared position in favour of stricter firearms laws. This is not the first time SSAA ACT has had cause to correct her firearms writing, nor the first time we have written to The Point about it:
May 2026 — Ms Predavec’s “NSW’s new gun laws are already working” claimed NSW gun numbers had declined. We showed this was a mischaracterisation: the data showed a slowdown in the rate of new acquisitions, not a fall in the total registered firearms. This new article repeats that same claim.
SSAA ACT has since made several formal complaints to The Point’s Complaints & Corrections process about its firearms coverage — concerning two further Predavec pieces (19 June and 22 July 2026), an article by the Institute’s Research Manager Alice Grundy (28 May 2026), and an article by Frank Noakes (11 August 2026). To our knowledge the corrections and disclosures sought remain outstanding.
Undisclosed interest. It is on the public record — ACT Legal Affairs Committee, Submission 034 (Annex E) — that Ms Predavec undertakes communications and fundraising for the ACT Greens and has been mentored by Greens MLA Jo Clay. The Greens are a declared proponent of the very measures these articles advocate. Neither that affiliation nor her Australia Institute employment is disclosed to readers.
We set this out plainly for members: a piece presented as neutral “data journalism” is written by a paid advocate for one side of this debate, repeating a claim she has already been told is wrong. Readers are entitled to know that — and, on the facts above, it is simply true.
Why this matters for the ACT
The article’s conclusion is aimed squarely at us: the ACT should “enact similar limits” and “follow NSW’s lead.” That argument runs against the evidence, not from it:
The ACT already records among the lowest rates of crime in the country, and the lowest rate of firearm theft of any jurisdiction — and its own committee recommended strengthened storage and compliance, not caps, as the priority against theft (Report 9, Recommendation 7).
The updated National Firearms Agreement (26 August 2026) adopted neither numerical caps nor any recategorisation — both were on the national table in December 2025 and were set aside. “National consistency” now points away from caps.
The ACT’s own Standing Committee on Legal Affairs recorded “significant uncertainty over the operation of the proposed numerical caps” (Report 9, Finding 1); the independent Lay Review found “no clear evidence that numerical caps on individual ownership, by themselves, reduce firearms-related harm.”
“Follow NSW’s lead” asks the ACT to adopt measures the national agreement dropped, that the ACT’s own inquiry doubted, and that the best independent review found unsupported — to solve a problem the ACT, on the figures, does not have.
What your Committee is doing
On the record
We are writing to The Point to request a correction of the claim that the NSW limits “have not yet come into effect,” and adding this analysis to our evidence library.
Fair, proportionate, evidence-based
We keep putting the ACT case on the evidence — the low baseline, the national agreement, our own committee’s findings, and the Lay Review.
Keeping you updated
Our full record of media releases, member updates and information briefs is on our Legislative Action webpage.
Sporting Shooters’ Association of Australia ACT Inc
General enquiries — info@ssaaact.org.au
Our full record of media releases, member updates and information briefs is available on our Legislative Action webpage.
Member information from SSAA ACT Inc. Sources: The Point / The Australia Institute, “The gun buyback can work, NSW shows us how” (31 Aug 2026); NSW Police Force “Gun Safe” Firearms Registry, “Apply for a Permit to Acquire a Firearm (PTA)”; ACT Standing Committee on Legal Affairs, Report 9; the Lay Review of Victoria’s firearms laws; National Cabinet Communiqué, 26 August 2026. Not legal advice.