Trends and issues
by Paul Peake
Australian Shooters Journal
August 1999
Public policies - whether they stem from inappropriate methodologies, inadequate data sets or just plain inferior science - are dangerous. For governments, the decision-making process is complicated by public perceptions and the need to vindicate previous strategies. The larger the bill for earlier decisions the more readily an administration will embrace favourable figures, especially if it has spent $500 million on a firearm policy which even ardent supporters like the anti-gun lobby's Simon Chapman agree impacts on "fewer than 10 victims a year". (1)
Recently the Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) released its Trends & Issues paper number 116, entitled Firearm-related Violence: The Impact of the Nationwide Agreement on Firearms. The study examined gun related crime and suicide figures between 1996 and 1997 and the effect of new laws on state and territory governments.
The anti-gun movement and particularly Gun Control Australia's national spokesperson Randy Marshall, went into overdrive following the report's release, clutching at the few statistical straws it contained to try and bolster a push for a ban on handguns. (2) A review of the evidence shows however, that the new laws have in fact had no tangible impact on overall crime or suicide rates in Australia.
| Firearm related deaths | ||
| State | 1996 | 1997 |
| New South Wales | 138 | 143 |
| Victoria | 94 | 100 |
| Tasmania | *15 | 19 |
Table 1. Source:
Adapted from Australian Institute of Criminology data.
(* Excludes victims of Port Arthur incident).
Table 1 shows that the number of firearm-related deaths actually went up in three states during the review period; the firearm homicide rate increasing from 0.39 per 100,000 to 0.42.3 Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) figures contained in Table 2 show that the total number of murder victims rose in seven jurisdictions.
Table 2.
Between 1996 and 1997 the total number of suicides increased dramatically from 2393 to 2723. Notably, the AIC report acknowledged evidence showing that: firearm availability bears no significant relationship to the overall suicide rate in the adult population (4) - something shooters have been saying for years (see Table 3).
Table 3.
The study reported a decline in firearm-related accidental deaths, noting a fall from 30 incidents in 1996 to 19 in 1997. The anti-gun lobby seized on the fact in the media but forgot to mention that the number of accidental deaths was actually lower in the year before the new laws were introduced.
The study also looked at the question of armed robbery. While it reported a slight decline in the number of crimes carried out with firearms (a trend since 1995) the rate of offences committed with alternative means increased considerably.
Table 4.
According to recently released ABS figures, 1998 saw a rise in the number of armed robberies throughout Australia (Table 5). The 1998 data shows some of the largest increases occurred in states with traditionally some of the strictest gun laws - South Australia up from 374 offences in 1997 to 637 in 1998 and Western Australia up from 1059 to 1395. In WA's case most of the new laws forced on the states and territories in May 1996, including comprehensive registration and the need to show a 'genuine reason' for possessing a firearm, had already been in place since 1931. Nevertheless, the state has rates of violent crime well above the national average - murder 1.69 per 100,000 (Aust 1.51) - armed robbery 76.17 per 100,000 (Aust 57.87) - assault 904.99 per 100,000 (Aust 709.24). (5) It also has one of the worst suicide rates in the country. Six decades of harsh gun control have certainly not made Western Australia a safer place.
Table 5.
The reaction to the AIC's report has ranged from cautiously smug, with the Federal Minister for Justice Amanda Vanstone arguing that it was too early to draw conclusions, but that the trend was "important in providing the community with a greater sense of safety" (6) to the clearly hyperbolic with Gun Control Australia's Randy Marshall describing the situation as "excellent news". (7)
With the findings in mind, arguing that the community is in some way more secure raises some important points.
It assumes that whatever trends the data may hint at are in fact a result of new laws. This risks falling into a dangerous after this, therefore because of this fallacy. Further, it ignores the often-substantial fluctuations in crime and suicide rates between individual years; a two-year span is a hopelessly inadequate data set. At the same time it fails to explain the significant downward movement in the misuse of firearms before the adoption of the changes, especially where suicide and accidental shootings are concerned and it also fails to explain why the abuse of firearms actually went up in some jurisdictions.
Given the continuing upward trend in serious offences it implies that violent crimes and suicides are somehow more acceptable if they are carried out with something other than a firearm. To insist that the community is safer because people are now being robbed more frequently with knives, syringes and baseball bats and more people are killing themselves via hanging, asphyxiation and poisoning is absurd. The fact is violent crime and suicide continues to rise.
When it comes to public policy, inferences built on bad information are indeed dangerous. They lead to ineffective and often very expensive schemes. In the case of the Federal Government's buy-back program the only significant impact has been on the freedom of hundreds of thousands of law-abiding shooters forced to surrender their property and the pockets of millions of Australian taxpayers forced to pick up the bill.
1. Chapman, S. (1999, May 20). Killer drug still a nice little earner. The Australian.
2. Turner, J. (1999, June 4). The firearms verdict: slightly safer. The Advertiser.
3. Mouzos, J. (1999). No 116, Firearm-related Violence: The Impact of the Nationwide
Agreement on Firearms. Australian Institute of Criminology - trends and issues
in crime and criminal justice. p. 3.
4. ibid. p. 5.
5. (1999). 1998 Recorded Crime: Australia. Canberra: Australian Bureau of Statistics.
6. Turner, J. (1999, June 4). The firearms verdict: slightly safer. The Advertiser.
7. ibid.
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