Firearms Amendment Bill 2019 Taken to the House

John Saldivar

On Wednesday, the Government introduced the Firearms Amendment Bill 2019. The bill provides for new licensing fees which will be lowered tremendously to appease gun license holders since the cost of security has increased. The decision to lower the fees but limit the amount of ammunition that a license holder can purchase per year was taken after the Police Department held consultations with stakeholders in November. It is expected that the new measures will assist the department in curbing crime, especially gang related violence in the Old Capital. Minister of National Security John Saldivar introduced the bill.

John Saldivar, Minister of National Security

“Madam Speaker this bill has the recommendation from the Cabinet. Just by way of explanation this has become necessary as a consequence of a previous amendment that we did that had raised the fees for personal firearm and for the companies’ firearm license that had some unintended consequences. In the case of companies they have passed this fee to the business who hire their services and this has resulted in many business cancelling their security arrangement which is not very good for security arrangement which is not very good for our security apparatus and of course holders of personal firearms we’ve had a great outcry with the increase that took place almost two years ago. We are hoping to make this adjustment in time for January first.”