Haynes cautious over firearms legislation

Anita Haynes
Anita Haynes

OPPOSITION Senator Anita Haynes yesterday expressed caution over both the technical aspects of a bill to curb illegal firearms and the philosophy behind it, speaking to Newsday.

Minister of National Security Stuart Young told Thursday’s post Cabinet briefing of his plans to amend the Bail Act to deny bail for someone held with an illegal firearm, for someone held with a firearm while on bail, and for someone on bail who is then held for serious offences such as gang activity, kidnapping or crimes with a penalty of ten years imprisonment.

Newsday saw self-contradictions in these proposals, with the first category already including crimes in the second category. We asked Haynes. She reckoned the new legislation to curb firearms would likely follow the many cases of recent legislation that the Opposition had complained had needed to be corrected.

“They have several pieces of extremely flawed legislation, but they expect the Opposition’s support. From the onset we have made it clear that we are not prepared to support bad legislation,” Haynes said. “It has been thanks to the Opposition’s efforts that several bills have been cleaned up to become passable legislation. They have got our support before.”

On the philosophy behind the firearms bill, Haynes hit, “They are throwing an extraordinarily wide net, using fear to push through legislation. We are a nation that is afraid. They want us to sell out our fundamental rights and freedoms.”

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