>>MPs in New Zealand have voted 119 to 1 to pass a gun reform bill that seeks to ban semi-automatic weapons and assault rifles

The Governor General has signed it into law but Police are asking responsible firearms owners not to deluge them with returned weapons, instead to register and secure weapons waiting for details of a government buy-back. IOW not much different today except that thousands of NZers are technically criminals.

There's a few other wrinkles to be ironed out, e.g. NZ participation in 3-gun competitions is effectively ended by law in current state with no exemptions for competition. And the exemption for pest control needs to be sorted.

Meanwhile gangs say they won't be turning theirs in, some say that the Treaty of Waitangi exempts Maori from any such firearm control, and high country farmers are saying that they already knew city dwellers were idiots so there's no reason why city shenanigans should affect weapons held by the same farming family for generations in some cases, with legitimate uses on rolling farm terrain.

My view? MSSA with oversized magazines aren't needed in cities at all, and rurally only when overrun by wallabies or when shooting pests from helicopters = changing mag every 4 shots or bolt action cartridge discards are dangerous and costly. Those sorts of exemptions are needed else the law is an ass and readers of Dickens know what that means.