Sask. gun community frustrated as Ottawa outlaws 324 more firearms

Check your gun safe before you head to the range next, because you might now own an outlawed firearm.

On Thursday the federal government added another 324 firearms to its “assault-style firearm” ban. The expanded ban came on the eve of the 35th anniversary of a gunman’s murder of 14 women at École Polytechnique in Montreal. This new ban is an addition to a prior ban outlawing more than 1,500 different guns in 2020, following a deadly mass shooting in Portapique, Nova Scotia.

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While some have applauded the federal government’s move to outlaw more firearms, members of Saskatchewan’s firearms community are feeling frustrated.

Darryl Schemenauer, owner of TNT Gunworks in Regina, said if these bans continue, it’ll mean the end of his business.

“It’s very, very tough for everybody,” said Schemenauer.

“It’s just that we can’t take many more hits before we’re going to be out of business.”

Because of the new ban, any firearms his business owns that are on the list can no longer be sold and must now go into storage until the federal government walks moves ahead with its buyback program.

Schemenauer said the firearms ban announced in 2020 was catastrophic for his business, and expanding the ban is just adding more fuel to the fire.

“We’re just taking more and more guns off the shelf and putting them in the back,” said Schemenauer. “There seems to be no buyback program or source of income coming back to us for this, and it’s going to hurt us, like huge.”

On top of the threat to his business, Schemenauer said he believes the people making decisions around the federal gun bans don’t know or use firearms, and shouldn’t be the ones making the decisions.

“These bans are done by people that really don’t know firearms, and that’s the big issue here. They’re calling these all ‘assault-style firearms,’ and they’re not assault-style firearms at all,” said Schemenauer.

“The people that do these rules and regulations should be gun people, and they’re not, and that’s the problem. There’s no knowledge of this kind of firearm out to the general public. If they knew what these firearms really were, a lot of these guns – probably 90 per cent – would not be banned.”

Gilbert White, recreational firearm community chair for the Saskatchewan Wildlife Federation, said he was also upset to hear about the expanded ban. He said the lack of communication between the federal government and firearms owners is apparent, and the lack of movement on the long-promised buyback program is infuriating.

“At the time of the first ban, the federal government said ‘Well, you know, we’ll definitely compensate you for your firearms.’ And this was supposed to happen fairly quickly, but it’s been four and a half years now,” White explained.

“And they told us people who had had those guns ‘Well, you can always go out and buy another one that isn’t banned.’ The unfortunate part is, a lot of people did that. They went out and bought these firearms to sort of continue their sports – either, you know, sports shooting or hunting – and now we’ve come to find out that these firearms have been banned, so they’re kind of caught between a rock and a hard spot.”

He said the government is targeting the wrong issues when it comes to addressing crime and gun violence.

“It’s an attack on low-hanging fruit,” White said.

“This ban, along with the other ones, will have absolutely no effect on criminals. They’ll still get their firearms and they’ll still commit the crimes. And if you look at the statistics right now, violent crime with firearms has gone up dramatically since, probably since 1995, when they brought in C-68 and imposed more regulations on us.”

He said that firearm restrictions have been issued by the government since 1892, but crime continues to worsen.

“We’re doing the same thing over and over and over again, but expecting different results, and they’re not getting it, so maybe it’s time to try something new,” White said.

“Ninety five per cent of firearm crime is committed with illegal handguns that have been smuggled across the border. So why not try and address that 95 per cent of the problem, instead of the five per cent?”

The federal government said the 324 firearms added to the list belong on the battlefield and not in the hands of hunters or sport shooters. The government also said the list of banned guns will be sent to the Ukrainian government, as the guns could potentially be donated to help support Ukraine’s fight against Russia’s invasion.

The full list of banned firearms can be found on the federal government’s website.