🔗 Share this article The nation's Firearm Laws: A Global Model That Needs to Persist, Especially After Bondi In the aftermath of the awful incident at Bondi, Australia is confronting several pressing reckonings. There is a long-overdue national focus on antisemitism, an persistent concern about public safety, and questions about how such an tragedy could happen. But, from the perspective of a public health expert and Australian Jew, the most important dialogue we are finally having revolves around firearms. A Decade of Warnings and a Successful Response Public health specialists have been issuing warnings about guns for at least a decade. In the wake of the Port Arthur massacre, Australians came together and enacted a suite of reforms to reduce gun violence across the country. The strategy succeeded. Before 1996, the nation witnessed approximately one mass shooting per year. Over the following years, there have been extremely rare significant tragedies, with none approaching the fatalities of the shootings in the 1980s and 1990s. The Bondi Tragedy and the Role of Current Laws Even during the Bondi tragedy, the nation's firearm regulations were not entirely useless. It has been suggested the alleged attackers possessed with bolt-action rifles and a straight-pull shotgun. These weapons are limited to firing a one round at a time, requiring a manual operation to chamber the next round. Although these guns can be fired quite quickly with lethal results, they remain far slower and less efficient than the high-capacity, self-loading rifles commonplace in international attacks. The number of deaths at Bondi would've been far higher if different firearms had been available. Stopping a future Bondi requires national cohesion. Regrettably, there are already fissures in the united front. Legislation Under Strain Yet, the horrific consequences of the incident demonstrates that existing gun laws are failing. Crafted in the late 1990s with the best of intentions, decades have worn away their effectiveness. Concerningly, there are currently a greater number of guns in Australia than before the Port Arthur shooting, with some individuals in cities owning collections numbering in the hundreds. The nation has grown overconfident and it has exacted a terrible price. The Road Forward: Proposed Reforms In the time after the Bondi tragedy, there have been multiple declarations regarding new firearm legislation. New South Wales in particular will shortly enact a package of reforms to mitigate the collective risk from firearms. The federal government has announced a new gun buyback, and there is hope for a national firearms registry, despite the complexities of aligning state and federal jurisdictions. These measures are only possible if the nation works together. As noted, when it comes to gun control, the country is only as strong as its weakest link. This is the very nature of the Australian federation – laws in one state are easily circumvented if they can be bypassed with a journey across a state line. Addressing Frequent Objections We hear the inevitable response that "guns don't kill people, individuals are". This is accurate in the identical way that aircraft do not fly passengers, pilots do. Certainly, planes can't fly themselves, but it would be virtually impossible for a pilot to move 500 people overseas without the aircraft. The horrific violence witnessed at Bondi would be all but impossible without firearms, and would have been far less damaging if the alleged terrorists had not had access to the firearms they used. Balancing Necessity and Safety There are valid needs for some Australians to own firearms. Farm work or controlling vermin in rural areas is incredibly hard without them. A total ban of firearms from the country is impractical, as in certain contexts they are essential tools. The achievable goal – what we must do – is to ensure that gun laws are modernized to accurately reflect the society we live in today. Australia's laws have historically been the admiration of the world, but time and distance has done its work and the nation is less secure as it once was. It is critical to learn from the tragedy of Bondi to heart, and ensure that coming Australians are equally safe as past generations have been. A friend remarked after the Bondi attack, "things like this just don't happen here". They don't, but only because the country has made concerted efforts to maintain its security. However horrific as the attack was, there is hope that it can serve as the final tragedy the nation ever sees.