We're from the Government, and We're Here to Screw Help You!

Via Ravenwood comes this charming news. It seems that police in Australia will be performing surprise "safe storage" inspections of gun owners homes:

POLICE will target gun owners in a series of surprise weapon safety audits across the Oxley Local Area Command and the State in coming weeks.

As Ravenwood so cogently asks:

"Note that this bigotry only happens with guns. Would people be so quick to accept the government beating down your door to see if you have an unsafe gas can in your garage, or keep your household chemicals under your sink?"

I don't think so.

The audit is aimed at preventing theft and injury caused by the unsafe storage of firearms, such as under a bed or in a cupboard, an unfortunate circumstance of improper firearm storage that police often have to deal with.

What, exactly do they "often have to deal with"? Theft? Injury? Or simply "unsafe storage"?

Oxley Local Area Command Inspector Tony Rogers said licence holders were required under the Firearms Act to keep their weapons and ammunition locked in a storage case as required for the class of firearm.

And this is precisely the kind of law the "gun ban safety" groups tell us they want to pass here. How could we possibly object to this kind of "common-sense" measure?

Police have detailed files of thousands of licence holders and have already begun random visits in the Tamworth area. The audit will extend the throughout the command area.
Inspector Rogers said it was a condition of the licence for gun owners to allow police onto their premises for safety inspections.

Of course it is. And who knows what else they might observe while they're inspecting the premises? After all, it's for your own good!

He said up to 10 police would carry out the operation throughout the day and also evenings.

Ten officers who won't be doing anything else that might actually make the public safer - like patrolling high-crime areas.

Category C, D and H firearms must be stored in a locked steel safe. When both longarms and pistols are being stored, then pistols can be stored in a longarms safe provided the pistols are secured by other means inside the safe. If the number of firearms stored exceeds 15, the safe must be located in a premises which is either fitted with a monitored alarm system or staffed 24-hours-a-day.

And understand, they can change the storage requirements at a whim, and you will no longer be in compliance.

It's just boiling the frog: Make it incrementally more and more onerous to acquire and keep firearms, and eventually the law-abiding will no longer bother to. It'll be too much hassle. And if it's not working fast enough, well all you need is some highly publicized prosecutions with significant fines and property loss to get the point across.

I will not license. I will not register. Period.