>> Exactly - waiting for the resident expert to confirm ;-)

Who would that be? ;-)

FWIW, the US is not the only jurisdiction that enshrines the legal right to bear arms. The original NZ law from 1846 also allows "carrying of arms" not just for sporting purposes, but specifically for self defense.

Of course context is important: there's no militia context in that law as there is in the US; instead the context is of armed-up Maori tribes and settlers and general unrest creating a need to regulate gunpowder and firearms, without treading on the right to bear arms. Perhaps a bigger difference is that authority to control licensing was granted to the Governor in 1860, with more recent laws in the 1980s and 1990s adopting more rigorous licensing and vetting of would-be firearm holders by Police, who are the official licensing agent. Previous life licenses were reduced to 10 years in the 1990s (with current proposals to reduce to 5 years) and access to some weapons needed additional license endorsement and compliance.

It is the current Police status as licensors that allows them to disallow self defense as a reason for firearms, despite law that apparently specifically allows it. While some firearm holders consider Police to be over-zealous, in general there's strong interest in safety and acceptance that in general there's good balance between safety and access- and Police still are not routinely armed themselves. Long may that continue in NZ as in Germany! FWIW, NZ Police licensing power is not absolute: In 2009 they decreed that any firearm with a pistol grip would be defined as a military style semi-automatic weapon, even if it was single shot. This decree was challenged and struck down in the High Court.

Bottom line is that only an idiot would assert in 2018 that they want firearms for self defense in NZ.