Taxpayers must be told how many of their dollars were spent on the Senate Inquiry into firearms violence.
A 180-page report into firearms violence, which was held over three different cities and that took close to a year to research, has no major recommendations into assisting public safety.
The Sporting Shooters’ Association of Australia (SSAA) has hit out at the waste in time and public money spent on the Greens’ ideologically based Inquiry that we suspect was nothing more than a witch hunt to further burden the lawful licensed target shooter and hunter.
“We will be issuing a Freedom of Information request to the Federal Parliament to find out exactly what this Inquiry cost the taxpayer,” said SSAA National CEO Tim Bannister.
Early on in the Inquiry it became apparent that the Greens Senate Inquiry Chair Penny Wright was not interested in listening to the evidence presented and had her preconceived prejudices against recreational shooting well and truly in place.
In fact, the majority of the Committee chastised her in the report for speaking to the media even before the Inquiry had finished and making unsubstantiated claims about firearm theft and their misuse.
“The report is astounding in that only one of the Committee members has added their name to the Chair’s recommendations. All other members have dissented and in fact make up the majority, with their own report recommending less red tape for licensed shooters and a study into the social, economic and environmental benefits of hunting across Australia,” Mr Bannister said.
“While the report was a waste of resources, we are pleased that finally commonsense is prevailing and we and Australia’s 800,000 licensed firearms holders are being listened to by our nation’s legislators.”