THE ARMS ACT

Hokitika Guardian, 3 January 1921, Page 4

THE ARMS ACT

NOW IN FORCE

|llV TKMMJIfAVH —PEK PIIKBS ASSOCIATION'] WELLINGTON, Jan. 1.

. To-day the Arms Act online into force, and it is an Act which will be rigorously enforced. It gives the police very wide powers, which include the right of search and of arrest without warrant. The Act contains clauses, among others, which provide that every firearm, whether a revolver, automatic pistol, and rifle or pea rifle, mqst be registered with the police, and that no ammunition may lie purchased without a permit from the police, an exception being made in regard to fowling-pieces. An important section relates to automatic pistols, and insists that these weapons and ammunition for them must bo surrendered to the State, through the police though the Government will reimburse owners from the Consolidated Fund. Returned soldiers or their near relatives alone may retain souvenir pistols, hut all otliet* such weapons must he given up. Revolvers, if registered may he kept in the home, but may npt he carried beyond the curtilage of the home without permit from the police. Other clauses deal with the sale of firearms and ammunition, by dealers and others, as well as of the importation or exportation ol arms and ammunition. Still another clause, and a most useful one, makes it a punishable offence for any person to point a fiVearm, loaded or unlbadcd —the “unloaded” weapon, being, in the light of many dreadful experiences, quite as dangerous as the loaded weapon—at another person. A breach of this section will render the off fender liable to a fine of £2O or to imprisonment for two months. The penalties for offences under other sections of the Act are heavy indeed, ranging from fines of £IOO to imprisonment for three months or, on indictment, to imprisonment for three years.